Where Women Roll and Men Thunder
by foojules
Summary: Modern AU. On an extended solo holiday in Australia, Sybil Crawley doesn't know whether she's finding herself or running away from a painful past. Car trouble brings her to the garage of an expat mechanic who's trying hard to escape his own demons. Can they hide together, or will their histories catch up with them?
1. Chapter 1: It's Overheated, I Think

_AN: This fic is dedicated to cassiemortmain, who gave me the idea to have (spoiler alert!) Sybil's car break down and Tom be the one to fix it. She was also kind enough to entertain my inane questions about her home country, help me eliminate unrealistic locations (apparently it's not a great idea to try and drive across the middle of Australia by yourself), and serve as a beta reader to help me get the details right (though any errors are my fault). Thanks so much, bb! Hope you enjoy._

_The title is a mondegreen from the Men at Work song "Land Down Under." The actual lyric is "Where women glow and men plunder." I've been hearing it wrong since childhood and I always wondered why they rhymed "thunder" with "thunder"...and now I have my answer._

* * *

Darling Downs, South East QLD, Australia: mid-March

Sybil drives fast. With no other cars around and a road that looks as though it could stretch across the continent, there's no reason not to. It's just gone noon, and the sun is a burnished coin in the sky and the air above the highway ahead bends with the heat. She's been in Australia almost three weeks now and it's officially autumn; the days have cooled on the coast and in the mountains, but where she is—two hours' drive inland and between ranges—the air remains sticky and motionless.

She lets the wind whip through for a while, yanking her hair out of its elastic to blow in tendrils around her cheeks and into her eyes and mouth, but the charm of it palls as the temperature increases. Soon she puts up the windows and turns on the air conditioner, which struggles valiantly but can't quite counteract the baking heat. The RAV4 she drives is far from new: Sybil bought it three days after she landed in Sydney with the admittedly impractical but irresistibly romantic notion that she'd drive wherever the road took her. The idea earned her a look of pure horror when she related it to the car's previous owner, a guy in his late forties who looked like he'd spent every day of it in the sun. He'd told her he was selling the wagon to upgrade to a van, needing more space for his two daughters' field hockey equipment.

"You want to know where you're headed," he warned when he heard her plan. "You don't want to be muckin' about on your own if you don't know what you're doing." Then he related a story about a group of German tourists who'd recently died of exposure after their Land Rover had broken down on the Canning Stock Route, a desert road "out the back o' Bourke," as he put it.

"Oh, I'm not going to try to drive across the outback or anything," Sybil told him with a laugh. "I'll always be within shot of civilization!" The man still looked doubtful, but she was paying cash and hadn't dickered too much over the selling price, so in the end he let her go with another admonition to look after herself and always carry blankets and plenty of water.

"A knife or something might not be a bad idea, either," was his parting tip. "You run across some strange rangers out in the country."

Right now she's on her way into the Bunya Mountains. The national park there was touted as a must-see by some friendly locals in Byron Bay, where she spent a few days poking into art galleries and ambling between beach and bars. In the spirit of adventure, Sybil has decided to let the road take her there. If the sat-nav is correct, it should only be a couple more hours' drive. Plenty of time to find a place to stay for the next few nights and do a bit of hiking. She's not picky: a B&B or holiday cabin will do nicely. This is one reason she didn't invite Mary or Edith, who would have taken one look at Sybil's hostel accommodation in Brisbane and run—or hired a car service—back to the airport.

Sybil smiles as she thinks of her nonchalant pledge to stay near civilization. A baldfaced lie, as the highway she's speeding along lacks any sign of it. Even the road is a faded silver-grey, crumbling at the edges as though it's trying to blend in with its surroundings. The country would be lovely if it weren't so blazingly hot. Since she came down from the mountain town of Toowoomba (which she drove through mainly because she wanted to see what a place called Toowoomba looked like) it's been crisped-looking farmland, with the occasional village or abandoned shearing shed. In these gently rolling hills landmarks reveal themselves a long way off, coming in and out of sight with the elevation of the land. A house shimmers into existence on the horizon, looking like a mirage. As Sybil gets closer she sees that it's two buildings: a large corrugated-aluminum shed and a smaller, dilapidated farmhouse with a peaked roof and a porch that looks within a breeze of falling off. The little compound huddles a hundred yards from the road amid scrub grass and tired-looking trees. It seems deserted until one notices the washing hung in the side garden. She wonders who'd live out here, an hour's drive from the nearest supermarket.

Out of the corner of her eye she sees a gleam of red on the dash: the temperature light's come on. _Damn. _She turns off the A/C and lowers the windows but the light stays lit, soon to be joined by its brother Check Engine. _Damn, damn, damn._ Her instinct is to keep driving and hope the issue resolves itself, but then she remembers the German tourists. She eases up on the accelerator, dithering. Seconds later the car decides matters by starting to shimmy in its path and releasing a great cloud of steam from underneath the bonnet.

She pulls off onto the dirt next to the road, there being no proper shoulder, and puts up the bonnet, dodging another cloud of steam. At the front of the engine compartment the radiator—at least she thinks it's the radiator—hisses and makes an ominous ticking sound. It doesn't seem like a good idea to touch anything. _Now what?_

Her mobile is in her messenger bag on the passenger seat, but it's about as much use out here as her wallet full of credit cards: there's no phone service, no data service. Sybil furrows her brow and looks down the road toward her destination, then turns and looks back the way she came. The metal shed by the house she passed earlier throws off a dull gleam in the sun, just barely visible. If someone's there they'll have a telephone, at any rate. With a sigh she coils her hair more securely on top of her head, puts her bag across her shoulder, and sets off.

It takes much longer than one would think to reach the house. It seemed as though it was only a couple of kilometers back, but by the time she trudges up its winding dirt driveway her throat feels coated in dust and there's a blister shooting glassy pain across her heel with every step. She wishes she'd thought to change into her hiking boots or even put on socks under her trainers before starting.

She mounts the porch and knocks. There's something about the way a knock on the door of an empty house sounds that lets you know it's empty; that's what her knock sounds like. She taps again anyway and goes over and peers into the window, hands around her eyes. She can make out dark humps of furniture in the dimness, a bookshelf full of books against the far wall. The place looks lived in, anyway. She starts to sit down on one of the plastic chairs on the porch to wait for the house's occupants to return, but then she catches a snatch of guitar melody from the direction of the shed.

Seeing a tow truck parked in back is the first stroke of luck she's had all day, and she feels even more fortunate when she reads the decal on the side of it: _Tom's Mobile Auto Repair. _The shed's large sliding door is open and the music wafts out, interspersed with the whine of some sort of machinery. She steps inside, blinking as her eyes adjust to the comparative dimness. There's a car up on jacks in front of the door but the cavernous space appears empty of people, though she still hears the intermittent metallic grinding. It bounces off the aluminum walls, painfully loud. "Hello?" She calls when there's a break in the noise. It doesn't start up again; nor does she receive any answer but the whir of a fan over John Lennon's mournful voice. It takes two more _Hello_s before a man—Tom, she assumes—appears in a doorway off to the right, where a wall has been rather haphazardly installed to create a separate room. He's holding ear protectors in his hands. He steps out into the main shed, eyes narrowed to make Sybil out against the backlight of the door. He's thirtyish, stocky, with dirty-blond hair that falls into his eyes and a few days' growth of beard. He wears oil-stained jeans and a badly faded INXS t-shirt. _A true blue Aussie boy if I ever saw one,_ Sybil thinks. Then he opens his mouth.

"Can I help ye, miss?" He lilts, and her eyes widen; an Irish accent is the last thing she expected to hear in this neck of the woods.

"Yeah, hi. My car broke down a little way up the road." Sybil notes a jump in one of his eyebrows, a twitch of his mouth. Maybe he's surprised by her accent as well. "It's overheated, I think." It's futile for her to try and sound like she knows what she's talking about when it comes to cars, but maybe if she attempts it he won't overcharge her _too _much. With that in mind, she pastes on a smile that's as charming as she can make it, in the circumstances.

He nods. "We'll just have a look, will we?" He disappears for a few seconds and reemerges _sans _ear protectors and wearing a wide-brimmed bushman hat that looks a hundred years old. "I'm Tom, by the way."

"I thought so," says Sybil, then remembers herself and offers her hand. "Sybil."

"Glad to know you, Sybil." His handshake is firm, fingertips rough with calluses. His eyes assess her, but not in a lecherous way; he goes to a mini-fridge wedged in next to a desk at the back of the shed and fetches a bottle of water. "Here. You look like you could use it."

"Oh, cheers." She opens it and drinks half in one go, water trickling from the corner of her mouth. With her hand she wipes it off her chin. "Yeah, I was a bit thirsty."

Tom turns off the lights and the first-gen iPod that's in a dock on the desk, its clickwheel smeared with black grime, and picks up a tool satchel which he places in the back of the truck. He closes and locks the door to the shed, and they're off.

Sybil's car is where she left it, pulled off the road with its bonnet up. Tom gets right down to business, but it takes no more than twenty minutes before he lets down the bonnet with a bang and a solemn nod. "I'll have to bring her in."

"Oh…" Sybil is disappointed, if not surprised. "I thought you might just be able to add some fluids or something."

He shakes his head. "No such luck, I'm afraid. Your radiator's leaking coolant. Spark plugs need replacing as well, and that's just what I can see at a glance." He gives her a sympathetic little smile. "Don't worry, I'll give you an estimate before I get too far into it."

They chat a little on the drive back. Tom asks where Sybil's headed; when she tells him he says he's not been, but he's heard it's nice. "How long have you lived in Australia?" She asks.

"Almost two years." She waits for him to go on. Most Irishmen she's met would be regaling her with the reasons they've come here, as well as the opinions of at least four family members on the advisability of their move. Tom, however, seems to be keeping his own counsel. She peeks at him sidelong. His features are more delicately drawn than she thought. He's in better shape too: what she mistook for stoutness at first glance is solid muscle. He's rather fit, really, in a scruffy kind of way. She's always had a bit of a thing for blokes with a few rough edges on them; it must come from growing up surrounded by boys who always had to wear ties.

When they get back he keeps her car hitched up to the truck, saying he's just got to finish the vehicle he's working on—"I said I'd have it for him tomorrow morning—" but it should be done by lunch. The mention of food makes Sybil's stomach gurgle. It's already quarter past one, and she wonders what time Tom sits down to his midday meal and whether he'd be willing to share. "I've only sandwiches," he continues, "but you're welcome to it. I'll have you on your way within a couple of hours after that."

Sybil thanks him and sits down in one of a trio of rust-speckled teal metal chairs under a tree a few yards from the garage door. She's got a book in her bag but doesn't take it out; the local fauna provide distraction enough to her weary brain. She watches in fascination as a galah with a deep-rose-colored breast lands on a branch nearby and starts grooming under its wing, muttering to itself in an oddly human timbre. Seeing such exotic birds going about their business like sparrows would at home is still a novelty to her. Cicadas whir and the temperature continues to rise until she's sluggish and perspiring, with strands of hair sticking unpleasantly to the back of her neck. The sun creeps higher, encroaching on her haven until she's forced to scoot her chair almost to the trunk of the tree to be in the shade.

She looks with longing toward the dark mouth of the shed's entrance. It looks like a cave, cool and deep. Quiet, too, now that the mechanic seems to have finished whatever he was doing in the back room. She can hear the occasional scrape or rattle over the spidery guitar—the iPod seems to be shuffling through the more psychedelic half of the Beatles' catalog—but nothing louder than that. Finally she stands and walks inside.

"OK if I sit in here?" she calls to Tom, whose legs are sticking out from under the dark green sedan he's working on. "It's scorching out."

He slides out, sits up, and smiles. He's got a smear of oil next to his nose. "Sure. I can turn on the air conditioner if you like." He nods toward an ancient unit set into the wall next to the door. "Though it doesn't really cool the air so much as blow around the heat."

"Oh no, it's fine," says Sybil politely. "It's much better in here even without it."

"I like having the door open if it's at all bearable. Feels less closed in that way."

"I agree," Sybil says, mostly so he won't feel like he has to change things around on her account. She's used to working long hours indoors; operating theatres don't have exterior windows. Tom slides back under the car.

There's a rolling chair at the desk, but instead of sitting Sybil prowls around looking at things. The area in front of the door is pure workspace, swept concrete floor and fluorescent lighting and a long countertop running along the wall to the left. Above it tools hang on hooks; below are drawers and cabinets of faux-oak laminate, all with neatly hand-lettered paper labels stuck on. Just beyond, on the back wall, the desk and fridge delineate an office area. The large space to the right of that is shrouded in dimness and has a small sink and a number of tall steel shelf units; it seems to be a repository for larger auto parts. In front of that is the doorway to the other room, through which Sybil glimpses a rack of free weights, a bench press, and a long metal table holding several small machines she cannot identify. _The man cave,_ she thinks, and a wry smile comes to her lips. She half expects to see posters of scantily clad women on the walls, but when she peeks through the doorway all that's there is a calendar from last year, turned to October and showing a picture of the Cliffs of Moher.

"I'm just about finished," says Tom from behind her. Caught snooping, Sybil backs out of the room guiltily. He's standing to one side wiping his hands with a rag. The slight curve of his mouth says that he has some idea of what she's thinking. "There's not much in the way of entertainment out here, I'm afraid."

"I was just admiring your organizational skills," Sybil replies, feeling inane. "A place for everything and everything in its place. Martha Stewart would be proud."

He laughs. "I found those cabinets on the side of the road in town."

"Oh, that's very trendy. It's called upcycling." Sybil tilts her head. "Or downcycling. I'm not sure which."

"Good to know. Though I don't pay much mind to trends, if you've not noticed." He grins. "You hungry?"

It's past three and Sybil hasn't eaten since morning. "Starving."

The path between house and shed is well trod, but there's a dense thatch of tall grass and shrubbery to one side of it. They're halfway between the two buildings when Sybil sees a flicker of movement out of the bottom of her eye and then another at her side, lightning fast, as Tom's hand shoots out to grab her arm and yank her backward. "Jesus, watch out!"

Her heart's in her mouth. "What—"

"Snake. You almost stepped on it." He nods toward the brush, where she just catches the tail end of a nondescript brown snake undulating into the grass. "You don't want to piss that one off."

She takes in a shaky breath. "Is it venomous?"

He chuckles and lets go of her arm; she hadn't noticed he was still holding it. "They're all venomous around here. At least it seems that way."

"Well, thanks. Sorry." She gives a sheepish smile. "Obviously I'm a newbie."

"Ah, don't let it bother you. I made a few stupid mistakes when I first came here." He grins. "Lucky I haven't ended up in hospital yet."

They enter the house through the back door, which gives on the kitchen. Sybil can tell Tom doesn't often get visitors; immediately he goes a bit stiff and starts tidying up, mumbling about it being a right wreck in here. She can see him seeing the place through her eyes and finding it wanting, though maybe that's all in her mind. Certainly she'd be embarrassed to bring a guest to a place like this but she reminds herself that _Not everyone can afford to live somewhere nice._ _Don't be a snob._

To say it's nothing fancy is putting it politely. Everything's old and worn. Dark-paneled 1970s cabinetry glowers from the walls, the warped linoleum floor crackles with every step, and there's a faint, stale smell of decades of soaked-in grease. It's not the sort of place someone chooses to live in; it's a house you settle for because you can't get anything better. "What a lot of space you have," Sybil says, a bit proud that she's managed to come up with something positive. "I think my entire flat could fit in this kitchen." She sits down at the rickety table in the center of the room. It's too small for it, lost in a sea of beige lino.

Drying his hands at the sink, Tom gives a shrug, a rather defensive one to Sybil's eye. "Most of it's pretty dilapidated. I don't even use it all; the two back bedrooms are full of old boxes. They've been there since I signed the lease."

"You don't have housemates then?"

"Nah." He gets sandwich fixings from the refrigerator and sets them out on the faded orange worktop. "Most people want to live closer in to town."

Sybil studies his back. He hasn't had a haircut in a while, and it reaches down nearly to the collar of his t-shirt. He opens a cabinet and reaches up for a couple of plates, pulling the shirt tighter around his ribs and letting her see the way his shoulders taper into his narrow waist. _No girlfriend?_ she thinks about asking, but doesn't. Instead she says, "Don't you ever get lonely?"

"Ah, sure," he answers easily. "But I get along. I see people when I go into town, get work through word of mouth. And I do a lot of reading." His voice takes on a note Sybil can't quite interpret. "It's quiet out here, you know. You can think."

Sybil wishes she could be as at peace with her own life as he sounds with his. "It sounds nice."

"'Course, there're the not-so-nice parts too. Scorpions, spiders. Snakes, as you've seen. I think there's a family of possums living in the roof." He pivots to carry their plates over to the table. "Before I moved here I always heard Australia was a place where nature's constantly trying to kill you, and that's not far wrong. D'ye want something to drink? Coke? Water?"

"Water, please." He fills glasses for them both and sits down. "Thanks." Sybil takes a bite of her sandwich and chews slowly: it's chicken salad, not her favorite by a long shot. But if there's anything her upbringing taught her it's how to be gracious in accepting favors. "So why did you move here?"

He smiles around a mouthful, swallows it. "It was either here or Alaska, and I hate the cold."

Sybil laughs. "That seems rather extreme. Were you that eager to leave Ireland?"

"Not really." His voice has gone flat, and Sybil can tell that's her cue to change the subject.

But something makes her press on. "So why did you?"

Tom takes a drink from his glass. "I've had a rule since I came out here," he says. "I don't talk about the past." His gaze meets Sybil's, electric blue in his suntanned face, and she is not certain whether the warmth that spreads upward from her neck is unease or something else. Though if she's honest, she doesn't get a dangerous vibe off him. _Ted Bundy's victims would probably have told you the same thing,_ a cold voice inside her head admonishes. It sounds rather like Mary.

"You didn't kill someone or anything, did you?" _Ha-ha-ha,_ say her tilted head and dancing eyes, but a split second before he answers she realizes she's holding in her breath.

"No one who didn't deserve it." He grins, taking it as a joke. Joking in return.

She leans across the table as if to impart a confidence. "Should I be looking around for pointy things to stick you with if you get fresh?"

His smile fades and he sits back in his chair, folding his arms and dropping his eyes. "You've got nothing to worry about." He doesn't seem offended in the slightest, but a pensive look has come over him that lays a stroke of contrition across Sybil's heart. One of his hands sneaks up to cradle his chin, oil-stained fingertips stroking the stubbled jawline. It has the air of a habitual gesture; something he does to help him think, or to soothe himself.

She gives him an apologetic smile. "It's not that I think you'd be anything other than a gentleman, only I've got to do my due diligence."

"Of course. A woman traveling alone." His eyes come back up and his even white teeth flash out at her and that heat rises into her cheeks again. "Which is quite brave of you, by the way." His hand leaves his chin to flap in the air. "A bit mad, but brave. I'm curious. How'd a posh English girl come to be driving about on her own in the Australian hinterland?"

Sybil lets her eyes fall to the table, feeling one side of her mouth curl up. "I'm not that posh. And I thought you didn't like to talk about the past."

His laugh echoes off the walls. He's got a nice laugh. "Well, I never said _you _couldn't. And anyway, five minutes ago is the past, if you want to get pedantic about it."

"Fair enough." Sybil takes her napkin out of her lap and lays it next to her plate, sips her water. "When I was a little girl, my grandmother—my mum's mum—and I would always talk about traveling together once I got older. Somehow I'd got it into my head that I wanted to go to Australia. When I was six I thought kangaroos were the coolest thing ever. So whenever she came over or I visited her in the States, we'd plan our trip. It was a fantasy, really." She smiles wistfully, recalling rainy New York afternoons spent poring over travel guides. "We'd talked about actually going after I did my A levels, but by then I was all gung ho about uni, so it changed to 'Oh, let's go after I've graduated.' But we never did, and this January she died."

"Oh. I'm sorry." His voice is soft with the respect one gives the dead. "It sounds like you were close."

"Yeah." She pauses for a beat, thinking about how everyone at Grandmama's funeral nattered on about what a full life she'd led and how it made Sybil want to scream. She appreciates that Tom hasn't thrown out any platitudes for her to deflect. "It was very sudden—she had a brain aneurysm. One day she was on the golf course in Boca Raton, and the next…" Tears sting the backs of her eyes and she takes a breath, blinking hard. "I suppose it's the way she would've wanted to go. She wouldn't have liked to linger." She sniffles and clears her throat. "Anyway, she made bequests to me and my sisters, and in her will she said that if she and I hadn't made it to Australia by the time she was gone, she thought I should use the money to go before I quit dreaming of it." Sybil smiles. "So I did. I cleared my diary for three months and flew in with no itinerary at all and bought a car to get around. I thought if I could sell it again before I went home it would be a wash in the end. I guess I didn't plan on repair costs."

"Or being stranded in the middle of nowhere," says Tom. "That car served you better than you think. You're lucky you broke down where you did… much farther out and you'd have waited a long while for someone to come along."

"I suppose you're right." Lucky, too, in that her rescuer does not seem inclined to take advantage of the situation in any way.

"So what do you do for a living, where you can take three months off just like that?" He gives her a quizzical look, with that hint of scorn she's familiar with from the early days in the hospital when certain people had a problem with her background. Before she'd proven herself.

"Nothing," Sybil admits, which elicits the rise of a sun-bleached eyebrow. "I mean, I'm a nurse, but I'm sort of… between jobs right now." He cocks his head with a _Do go on_ expression, and she sighs heavily. "It's a long story."

"Part of the past you don't talk about?"

"Something like that."

"Fair enough." He grins. "So do you live in London town then, with your wee flat? Or is it somewhere else?"

"Yeah, London. Bethnal Green. Have you ever been?"

"To London? Of course." He smirks. "It's where my brother had his stag night. Stag weekend, I should say."

"Your brother went all the way to London for his stag party?"

"Well, he lives in Swindon. Has a garage there."

"So mechanical skill runs in the family, then."

That gets a perfunctory chuckle out of him. "It's a living." He pushes back from the table, gathering up their plates. By the time Sybil thinks to offer to do the washing up, the dishes are already dripping on the rack. "You can stay in here or come out while I work," he says. "I don't mind either way. I like a bit of company."

"I'll come out, then." She likes company too, and she's enjoying Tom's. Beyond the flashes of wit she's seen—not to mention the fact that he's already saved her life at least once—she senses there's more to him than meets the eye, which intrigues her. What meets the eye is of no little interest as well:_ I wouldn't mind watching him bend over my car again._ She bites her lip to suppress a grin.

He pulls the sedan out of the garage and backs the tow truck in, lowering the RAV4 with a gentleness that seems so ingrained that Sybil thinks he'd probably do it the same way even if she weren't there watching. She sits in the office chair with her book, but finds herself paying more attention to Tom than the page in front of her. He quickly becomes absorbed in his work. He whistles a bit, countermelodies to the music that's playing, and occasionally he'll murmur an instruction or mild curse to himself. It's hotter in the garage as the afternoon reaches its height. After a while he comes over to the fridge and gets out a couple of bottles of water, hands her one, and runs the other across his sweating forehead. Eyes closed, he rubs the condensation over his face with a little groan of contentment.

Sybil's eyes flick down a split second after his open. "You still OK?" He asks. "You want me to turn on the air conditioning?"

"Mm-mm, just fine," she almost squeaks. "I'm not the one working."

He eyes her with a faint, quizzical smile and she feels as though her skull has become transparent. "You sure?"

Her face is hot; she must be the color of a tomato. "Positive!" She fans herself with her book. "I don't mind sweating a bit. In this weather you just have to embrace it, yeah?"

"That's how I look at it," he says, and carries his water back over to the car. From behind the bonnet he says, "Erm… what's your boyfriend think of you taking off round the world for three months, anyway?" It's a clumsy line and he knows it, his voice coming out brash but underpinned with uncertainty. If he'd tried it on her earlier Sybil would have written him off as a wanker and frozen him out.

Now, though, she plays along. "Oh, I haven't got a boyfriend."

"Good." Then, too quickly: "I mean, I'm sure he'd miss you."

"He would, terribly. If I had one." She gets up and walks around the car so she can see him.

"And you'd miss him." Tom's eyes are fixed downward, but there's a small smile on his face.

"It'd make it a bit difficult to sow any wild oats, yeah." Sybil grins. "My sister Edith said I was coming out here to do my own version of _Eat, Pray, Love._"

Tom gives a chuckle. "How's that going for you then?"

Sybil makes a face. "Well, I have been doing a bit of eating."

That tickles him. He straightens and laughs, throwing his head back. "That's a good 'un, that is. You know, you're funny."

Sybil drops her eyes."Oh, my sister's the witty one. Not Edith; my oldest sister, Mary." she considers. "Though she can be a bit mean with it sometimes."

"It's a poor comic who can only laugh at someone else's expense," says Tom, plunging his hands back under the bonnet. "My brother's a bit like that. Makes me cringe when he gets going sometimes."

"The brother in Swindon?"

"Nah, the younger one. Declan."

"Is he in England too, or still in Ireland?"

"He—bloody hell!" Tom springs back from the car, hissing in pain.

Sybil jumps. "Are you all right?"

"_Fuck!_" He's cradling one hand in the other; there's blood. Instinctively Sybil rushes forward to examine it, but he waves her off. "It's grand, it's grand." He runs his black-stained fingers over the injury in a way that makes Sybil wince. "I just scraped off a bit of skin, I think. Jesus, that stings."

"We need to get it cleaned and bandaged." Sybil looks around. "Have you got a first aid kit in here?"

"Sybil… it's fine." He gives her an indulgent smile. "I appreciate the concern, but it's only a flesh wound." He shows it to her: the top layer of skin on the back of his hand is torn, but the bleeding's already mostly stopped.

But Sybil's training has taken over, and she won't be able to relax until she's seen to him. "Whatever you cut it on was probably filthy. There's dirt and bacteria in that scrape, and it needs to be washed and protected. Do you remember the last time you had a tetanus shot?" Grasping him by the elbow, she leads him over to the sink.

"Yeah, couple years ago. OK, OK, I can wash my own hands, Jaysus." Tom shakes his head and smiles. "Well, if you did get sacked, whoever did it's mad. You're a wonderful nurse."

"Oh, please," Sybil retorts. "I haven't even done anything yet. Have you got any bandages in the house?"

"There's a first aid kid in the desk." He jerks his chin in that direction, and follows Sybil when she hastens over. She opens drawers until she finds a small metal box full of supplies that look like they were packaged in 1980, but they'll do. "I was more talking about the way you bullied me," he laughs as she applies ointment and gauze to his hand and wraps it up. "You must be a fearsome sight when someone doesn't follow doctor's orders."

Sybil gives a chuckle. "Yeah, well, we can't have your hand getting infected with you all alone out here in the bush." She looks up into his face, which is closer than she'd realized. He's perched on the edge of the desk while she stands in front of him, and their eyes are level with each other. "Where would you be then?" Her heart has started to beat faster: she can feel it fluttering in her chest like a small, excited bird. Tom's eyes hold hers for a second, then flick to her mouth, then back up to her eyes. One corner of his mouth turns up slightly, absently, as if he's unaware of what it's doing. Sybil realizes that this is the moment where she can either smile and turn away and let him get back to work on her car, or she can make the move she's been wanting to make for at least the past hour.

_Oh, why not,_ she thinks, and she leans forward and kisses him.

* * *

_AN#2: I have the next chapter pretty much done, so I won't leave you hanging for too long!_


	2. Chapter 2: Just a Bit of Fun

_AN: Thanks so much for the response to Chapter 1! So yeah, there's a little bit of sex in this chapter. Fair warning._

* * *

He's a good kisser.

_Really _good.

Some men want to devour you when they kiss you, a remote part of Sybil's brain muses, while others seem to be attempting to bathe your face with their tongues. Some kisses are too dry and some too wet, some too soft and others too hard. In Sybil's life there have been very few kisses that made her weak in the knees, let alone produced the full-body groundswell that surges through her now.

She doesn't know how much of it is down to technique. Certainly Tom's is all one could ask for; his lips firm yet pliant on hers, strong without dominating. He returns her kiss eagerly but he doesn't overstep. He responds to her, both of them adjusting without effort as they press into each other. But there's something else going on too, some elemental attraction that makes her find the smell of his sweat improbably erotic and leaves little trails of sparks wherever he touches her. _Chemistry._ It can't be forced, can't be faked. She's sensed it practically since she first set eyes on him, and from the soft moan he makes deep in his throat when she opens her mouth for his tongue, he has too.

His hands at her waist pull her closer as he stands. Sybil tilts her face up toward his and puts her arms around him. Her fingers spread open to make a reconnaissance of his broad back: softness of million-times-washed cotton, solidity of muscle underneath. It's not timid, her exploration. She squeezes and massages and reaches around him until she can scratch her nails down from shoulders to sacrum, and all the time their mouths slip hot and wet on one another. They spill serrated breaths, guttural hungry noises. One of his hands moves up to her breast, and even through her clothing the touch makes her shiver and gasp. His right hand, the bandaged one, slides up her back to her neck. As he pulls her into another kiss he plunges his fingers into her hair, massages the base of her skull. His left hand drifts away from her chest and she grabs it and presses it back. Against her lips he gives a throaty laugh, full of lust and promise.

Then, abruptly, he stops. It's the proverbial needle scratching across the record. With his face an inch from hers he quirks an eyebrow and murmurs, "What're we doing, here?"

She considers just wrapping her fingers around the back of his neck and pulling him back to her. Instead she takes a breath and bites on her lower lip. She's already decided what she wants. "I think," she says, "that we're about to shag."

The smile that spreads across his face is like the sun breaking through and it makes a shivery thrill emanate straight out from the center of her. "Just making sure." Sybil almost screams at how long he just stands there _grinning _before he leans in. She thinks he's going to kiss her again, but instead he dips his head and his searing tongue pushes against the tender flesh of her throat. She moves her hands to his shoulders and across his back, pulling him closer as he sucks and probes at the pressure point beneath her ear. Sensations ripple from the spot that make her gasp, make her heart race and her chest rise and fall like the heroine's in a trashy novel. She's aware that the whole situation is a cliché, and Tom the mechanic with his muscles and stubble and fringe falling into his bedroom eyes fits the mold too perfectly. Caught up in the moment, she couldn't care less.

But there is one thing. Before they get too far into it she pulls back, flapping a hand toward her car and mumbling, "Let me just fetch… in the car," and squirms away. He watches, bemused, as she goes into the back for her suitcase and rummages through it until she finds the triple packet of condoms she bought in Sydney _just in case._

Realization clicks into place on his face when he sees what she's got in her hand. "Well," he says with a smirk, "It's a good job someone's prepared."

She smiles and gets one out of the carton, setting it down within reach but still wrapped. "What, you don't have a case of them for all the women who wash up on your doorstep?"

He chuckles as she moves back into his arms. She stretches up and they kiss, lips soft, tongues soft. "I'll admit it," he breathes into her ear, "you're the first woman I've touched in…" he takes a quivering inhale as her fingertips circle his nipple through his t-shirt. "...in a long while." His lips drift along her jawline toward her chin, move up to her mouth and linger to savor it. They travel lightly along her opposite jaw to her other ear, where his breath tickles and makes her shiver when he murmurs into it. "You're so beautiful."

_So are you._ But she doesn't speak because he's started nibbling on her earlobe. He sucks on it gently and the only sound she can make is an almost embarrassingly loud moan. He's pulled her close and she can feel his hardness pressing against her thigh through their clothes; she undulates, rubbing against it, and he lets out a moan as well.

"My God, you are fecking _sexy_." The last word is almost a growl. His hands land on her arse, first squeezing and then _lifting_. Sybil lets out a squeal when she feels her feet leave the floor, but her journey is a short one: only to the desktop, which is metal and holds its own heat as though it's alive. She smiles, using her hands and feet to draw him between her parted legs for another kiss. His hands move up her back underneath her shirt and back down to take it by the hem and pull it over her head. Their mouths meet again, his fingers smoothing over her cheeks and tangling in her hair. Seconds later his mouth is on her cleavage, warm and wet as he yanks her bra cups down. She reaches back to unhook it and he drags the straps from her shoulders.

"Ohhh," Sybil moans. She feels like her knees have been replaced with stretched-out rubber bands, like she'd collapse if she tried to stand up. There's an ache in her groin that pulses along with Tom's tongue on her nipple. She thrusts herself toward him without thought, without intention. Dimly, she registers his hands at the fastenings of her shorts. Once he gets them unbuttoned and unzipped she lifts her hips so he can push them down. Then it's a bit of a scramble to remove her shoes and shorts, along with his shirt, and push aside the papers and things on the desk so she can lie back on it, propping herself on her elbows.

The right side of his chest bears a round, puckered scar like a cratered third nipple: long healed, and less than a centimeter across. When he bends to trail kisses down one breast to her stomach, Sybil notes a larger, ragged counterpart on his back just below his shoulder blade. _Exit wound,_ the nurse says inside her head. His mouth on her inner thigh pulls her mind away from that. He doesn't bother teasing: in the next few seconds her knickers are gone and his tongue is on her clit. With a gasp she slips down off her elbows onto her back. His roughened palms slide up her thighs to ground her to the desk's surface when her hips try to rise up off of it. He brings her swiftly to orgasm, burying his face between her legs and licking and sucking while she thrashes and whimpers.

He straightens up and immediately she pushes herself up off the desk and pulls him to her, pressing her mouth hard against his and thrusting her tongue into his mouth. He lets out a gasp and then a moan when her hands undo his belt and slide into his waistband. Sybil is in no more of a mood to delay than he was; in minutes his jeans and pants are crumpled on the concrete floor. They find the condom, unwrap and apply it, and she perches on the edge of the desk.

She can feel her eyelids flutter as he pushes into her. It feels… "Oh, God, you feel so good," Sybil murmurs when he pulls out and pushes in again. Something about the way they're positioned, and her nerve endings are still on high alert. He just moans and buries his face in her hair, presses his mouth to the side of her neck. He grips her hips with wiry strength and they move together, faster and faster. She can feel the wave rising within her again, a little higher with each thrust, until he moves his hips _just so_ and it overflows, making her cry out and clutch at his shoulders. His muscles flex under her hands, tension coiling tighter and tighter in him until it finally releases, his voice escaping in explosive groans through his teeth as his body sags against hers.

His lips brush her cheek while her knees fall open, legs unwrapping from around his back. He stays inside her for a moment; then he gives her a peck on the temple, reaches down between them, pulls out and turns away. Muscles ripple in his back and Sybil barely notices the scar. She's straightening her legs down in front of her, finding her clothes, putting them on. Behind her, Lennon's voice floats out of the iPod dock speaker. _Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall..._ She feels like she's awakened from a surreal dream.

Tom gets dressed as well, facing the garage door. When he's done he turns and gives her a boyish grin from underneath his fringe and something inside her chest pulls tight; in this moment she could almost say she loves him, a man she met five hours ago. Her legs are still a bit quivery, and she reaches behind her for the edge of the desk.

His eyes glow warm; she wonders what he's thinking about her. He runs a hand through his hair and ambles toward the door of the garage, which is still wide open. There are a couple of hours remaining before sunset, but the aggressive blue of the sky is growing tired. He turns back to face her with another smile, this one rueful. "I don't think your car's going to be finished much before dark."

She shrugs, smiles in return. "I can hardly fault you for that, can I?"

"Probably not the best idea to be out alone on this part of the highway at night." His voice is even. Careful. "Specially in a questionable vehicle."

"I should think you'd have more confidence in your abilities." Her head tilts, eyebrow rising, chin thrust forward.

"Oh, it's not my abilities I doubt." He gives her a look just this side of arrogant and adrenaline whooshes lightly in Sybil's stomach as her mind goes unbidden to the other ability he's just demonstrated for her. He walks slowly around to the other side of her car. "Who knows what else might be wrong with this piece of… where'd you buy it, anyway?"

"Guy in Sydney." She lets it come out a bit sharp, not bothering to hide her displeasure at what he seems to be implying. She can make good choices; she's not a helpless little girl. "It's gotten me this far."

Tom bends to inspect the tire tread and gives an infuriating little shake of his head. "Hope you didn't pay much."

"I didn't."

Her icy tone gets his attention. He stands up with a wide-eyed _Oh, shit_ kind of look on his face and begins to babble: "It's not that it's a bad car… I mean, it's fine for getting around for a couple of months on decent roads. It'll be grand after I've done a bit of work on it…" he presses his lips together and his hands beat a light rhythm on the sides of his legs. "Tell you what. Let me look her over for you before you set off again, make sure it's all sound." When she hesitates he plunges on: "It's to ease my own mind. I hate to think of sending you off in something that's going to leave you stranded. No extra charge."

"And how long will that take?" She has thawed marginally, but her lips still purse in a way that her family would recognize as one of the few traits she's inherited from her paternal grandmother.

"Erm… well, if I work through 'til dinner and wake up early to deliver that one…" he waves out the door toward the car he finished with before lunch. "Midday tomorrow? You'll be in the mountains well before dark." He looks at his feet and Sybil could swear she sees a blush darkening his lightly freckled cheeks. "You're, ah, you're more than welcome to stay here tonight." _Where the bloody hell else would I stay?_ Sybil wonders, but her annoyance has faded. "And of course I've no expectations," he adds. "I'll sleep on the sofa."

"No, I will." The words come out quicker than she can realize she's decided to take him up on his offer. But the decision feels right, and what else is she meant to do? "And I'll cook dinner as well. Least I can do," she overrules when he opens his mouth to protest. She smiles. "Assuming you've got food, of course."

He concedes defeat with a nod. "OK." A grin sneaks onto his face. "It might be better if you go in the house and let me work. We've seen how well I handle distraction."

-ooo-

Sybil carries her suitcase up onto the front porch and into the farmhouse, drops it in the front room, and goes back outside with her book. With the sun no longer beating down so fiercely and a light breeze blowing it's quite nice out, especially in the hammock she finds suspended between two sad-looking gum trees in the side garden. She settles in with her book but within minutes it's slack in her hands, her eyes fixed on the deceptively tranquil sweep of fallow land before her and her mind inside the garage. With the house between them she can no longer hear the bang and scrape of whatever Tom's doing to her car. Nature, restless and alive with sounds, settles into her ears and becomes its own kind of silence.

She doesn't do things like this. Never before in her life has she had sex with a man she isn't dating seriously, let alone one she just met. Of course, all bets were off for this trip—her purchase of the condoms proves that much—but the pure serendipity of the encounter, the picaresque randomness of her path to this moment, have her both intrigued and confused. It wouldn't be so unsettling if she could put it down as a lark, but emotions swirl within her that she is quite sure should not be as strong as they are. _You don't even know him,_ she tells herself. She thinks again of the gunshot wounds, of him saying _I don't talk about the past. _She may be stupid to trust a complete stranger in this remote corner of the world, especially one wearing a badge of violence on his chest. But her intuition tells her that she has nothing to fear from him.

After a while the sun rides low in the sky and Sybil goes inside to have a shower. In the bathroom she pulls the curtain aside and looks askance at a stall of rusted-out aluminum; she can see wallboard peeking through in a few places, there's an industrial-strength spider's web in the upper corner that she's afraid to inspect too closely, and a layer of grime coats the whole of it. She wrinkles her nose. _Surely he doesn't bathe in here. _The toilet and sink are old and stained with mineral deposits, but clean. Thinking she'll let the water get hot while she undresses, she turns on the tap, but all that comes forth is a series of startlingly loud knocking sounds which continues until she turns it off. _OK then._

Tom is almost comically apologetic when she interrupts him to explain her predicament. "Ah, I should've told you first thing. That shower never worked, least not as long as I've lived here. I rigged something up outside." _Outside?_ He leads her around the back of the house to a shower head suspended above a raised pallet of sanded boards. The house blocks it from the road, but on the other three sides it's completely open.

"What do you do in winter?" asks Sybil.

Tom gives a shrug. "Quick showers. Bird baths in the sink when it's really cold." They stand awkwardly for a moment. "Well, I'll leave you to it then," he says, and heads back toward the garage.

Bathing outdoors is surprisingly resort-like in these wild surroundings, and the supply of water is hot and strong enough to dispel the chill creeping into the air as the sun sinks. There's nothing between Sybil and the full glory of the sunset spread out to the west; with the warm water sluicing over her head and shoulders, she takes a mental snapshot to carry with her for always.

A light coming on in the house reminds her that she promised her host a hot meal, so she shuts off the water and dries off with one of the towels she carried out from the linen cupboard. She's brought clean clothes as well: a knit camisole and a long, airy cotton skirt, with knickers that she made sure were _not _the ones with the stretched-out elastic. She finds Tom in the kitchen with his head in the fridge. "Hiya," he says, coming out with a pair of bottles. "Erm… fancy a beer?"

"Sure, thanks," she says, though she's usually more of a wine drinker. Beggars can't be choosers. "I do hope you weren't planning on cooking."

He gives her a slightly guilty smile but demurs. "I wouldn't dream of it. I'm afraid I don't have much to work with. I don't shop very often. There's, uh…" he dives into the nearly-empty produce drawer. "If I'm honest, I usually just doctor up some ramen when I eat dinner at all. I've got some Chinese leaf that's still good and there's some stuff in the freezer, frozen carrots and prawns and scallops…"

"I'll do just fine," she tells him.

"OK. I'm sure whatever you make will be delicious." He's kind enough to sound as if he believes it. "I'll just go and have a shower before it gets too cold."

While filling a pot at the sink, Sybil notes that the window above it offers a direct sightline to the shower. It's dark enough that Tom only shows up as indistinct angles of light and shadow carved against the blur of the meadow beyond. Realizing that in the lighted window he can probably see her better than she can him, she drops her gaze to her task.

He comes back inside shivering. "Damn, it's got nippy out." It's warm in the house and even warmer in the kitchen, with steam rising off the wide-mouthed bowls of noodle soup Sybil ladles out. "That looks great," he says politely, though she's done nothing but boil things and dump in flavoring packets.

After they've eaten Sybil says she'll do the washing up. "But you cooked," Tom protests.

"I'm imposing on you," she counters.

"No, you're my guest. Guests don't clean." He sidles between her and the sink and turns on the water. "You can dry if you insist on doing something."

So Sybil dries. When they're done there's another one of those awkward moments. They hover a few feet apart, Sybil next to the sink and Tom by the cabinet where he's been putting away the bowls. Sybil thinks about what happened in the garage and tries to stop herself from thinking about what happened in the garage. She can almost watch the same thing happening in Tom's head. She envisions him coming over and taking the tea towel gently from her hands, laying it on the counter, kissing her. She considers crossing the kitchen and putting her arms around him.

"Well," he says, his voice loud in the sudden charged silence, "It's an early morning for me." He moves toward the door. "I'll just fetch you some bedding. Sleep as late as you like; there's tea and oatmeal in the pantry if I'm not back by the time you wake up."

She thinks it'll be hard to get to sleep, in an unfamiliar place and after everything that's happened, but she's out almost as soon as her head hits the dust-smelling cushion. She wakes in the dark an indeterminate number of hours later, her mouth a desert. She goes into the kitchen without turning on the light, finds a glass, fills and empties it. The stovetop clock reads 2:16. Returning to the living room, she turns her head to look down the hall and sees that there's a line of yellow light under Tom's bedroom door.

Now she can't sleep. She must have been bloody exhausted before. The sofa is full of lumps and sharp protrusions that feel like broken springs. He mustn't use it very much; there's no television, and the room's single lamp overhangs the easy chair that's on the other side of the room near the bookshelves.

After what feels like an hour of fruitless tossing and turning she sits up and cranes her neck down the hall. His light's still on.

_Ah, fuck it._

She goes into her suitcase in the dark, smiling at herself when she cringes at the rustling noise she makes. _What, you're worried about disturbing him?_ She pads down the hall and taps lightly on his door.

"Come in." His voice reveals nothing; no surprise, no pleasure or annoyance. When Sybil opens the door he's propped up in bed reading. "You can't sleep either, eh?"

"I did for a few hours." She manages to keep her eyes from straying to his bare chest.

"Yeah, you've had quite a day." He winces slightly. "I mean, with the car and everything."

_And everything._ She can't help but smile. "Well," she says, "It wasn't all bad." Tom smiles too; they're both thinking the same thing. It's as good an opening as any: _Just out with it._ She faces him as boldly as she knows how. "Did you want to, erm…" her nerve fails her and she trails off, showing him the condom in her hand.

His eyebrows jump and his mouth works as he tries in vain to keep the grin off his face. "Well, ye know I won't say no." Deliberately he closes his book—_Catch-22_—and sets it to one side. When she hesitates, he cocks his head and says, "C'mere."

She walks over and perches on the bed at his side, her eyes never leaving his. For a few seconds he studies her face. They both lean in at the same moment but it's not like in the garage, not groping and eager. Their lips meet cautiously, as though they are on opposite sides of a thin membrane they're trying to keep intact. After a bit his hand comes to her cheek. Blindly Sybil sets the condom on the bedside table and scoots closer, presses her lips into his, opens her mouth and runs the tip of her tongue along his upper lip. His breath sighs from his nostrils and his other arm comes around her. "I've a confession to make," he murmurs against her mouth.

"Mm? What's that?" His tone is light and so she doesn't pull back, trusting that he's not about to tell her that in fact he has several young women buried underneath his porch.

He sits back a bit and drops his eyes. "I may have had a peek while you were showering." He looks back up at her. "I swear I didn't intend to, I just happened to look out—"

She laughs. "It's all right. I did too, only it was so dark I couldn't see much."

A smirk comes to his face, the expression of a kid who's got into the biscuit jar. "I could."

_Naughty boy. _She gives him a mock-reproachful look. "Well? Did you like what you saw?"

He nods. "I thought about coming out and joining you."

"You should have done."

The flame burning low in his eyes flares up. He makes a sound in his throat like a growl and kisses her again. Sybil scrambles over him onto the other side of the bed and underneath the sheet that covers him, and they settle into each other, lying face to face. Neither is in any rush. Their hands wander, making erogenous zones of elbows and hipbones and, after Tom pulls back the sheet and drops toward the foot of the bed, feet and ankles and knees. Sybil's still in the camisole and underwear she bedded down in; Tom's still in his boxers. He works his way upward slowly, but it's deliberate rather than teasing, as if he's trying to memorize every inch. By the time he slips his hand into her knickers she's practically vibrating.

"_Oh._" Her hips thrust involuntarily and he responds with a kiss to her stomach. His fingers slide inside her, thumb rubbing against her clit until she's writhing, breathing hard. He sits up and peels her knickers down over her hips, then settles down again.

If the garage was a headfirst leap, now he dips in one toe at a time. At first he doesn't use his tongue at all, just presses her with light, almost fluttering kisses as his hands gently massage her calves and feet. But soon the tip of his tongue ventures out. She's been waiting for it; she moans and wriggles at the first touch. At that he groans and begins to taste her in earnest, bringing his hands up to spread her legs open. Soon she's not even paying attention to the sounds coming out of her mouth. Her body moves any way it wants to with no input from her conscious mind. When she comes it's less an explosion than the cresting of a wave, the natural progression from what came before. It doesn't end right away, just tapers off from sublime to merely sensuous. Tom gives a moan that vibrates from the core of her and pushes her into another ripple of wavelets. Gradually, the flicking of his tongue slows until it's barely moving at all. She lies on her back dazed, each exhale coming out as an audible sigh of satisfaction, while he remains where he is.

Eventually he lifts his head. "I love the way you taste." Lowers it again, and his languid tongue draws another sigh from her.

She comes back up to reality slowly, finally reaching down to palm his cheek and draw him up to her. They kiss, his tongue as clever inside her mouth as it was between her legs, and she rolls them over so he's on his back. She sits up astride his lap and pulls her camisole over her head, relishing his appreciative smile and the way his eyes run over her, unabashed and as sensual as a physical caress.

"I want to see how you taste," she says, and kisses her way down his chest, his stomach. The small muscles flutter underneath her lips. She takes off his boxers and he sucks in a breath when she grasps his cock in her hand, stroking lightly up and down.

"Ahh, Sybil," he murmurs, and her name sounds like honey dripping from his mouth. She wants to make him say it again, and when her mouth envelops him he does. He's… bigger than what she's been used to, not that she's had that much variety, but she soon adjusts. And he's not shy about letting her know what he likes, which seems to be almost anything she does. "Oh, God, Sybil," he breathes as she settles into a rhythm, hand and mouth caressing in tandem. Soon his breath comes ragged and his hips shift restlessly. Sybil can tell he's close. She swirls her tongue around, making him moan so loudly that something skitters in the ceiling, but then he gasps and squirms, pulling at her. "No—come up here. I want you with me." He draws her up to lie on top of him, his naked skin oddly soft against hers. They grind together until it's too much and he tears the condom open with his teeth and she takes it from him and puts it on and they both sigh as she slowly brings him inside of her.

She moves in languid strokes that feel more like keeping afloat than swimming. His mouth captures hers and she's so involved in the sensations of their lips slipping together, the slow exchange of their breath, that she barely notices she's slowing down until she has already come to a stop. Somehow that makes it even more intense, especially after she breaks the kiss and opens her eyes. For a long while they do little more than breathe and look into each other's faces. She can feel him inside her, shifting softly with each breath, but mostly it's his luminous eyes and him looking at her the way he is: awed and grateful and a little disbelieving, like he's a castaway and she's just pulled a boat up on shore.

There's a tension rising deep within her, but it's almost like it's happening in someone else's body. She feels unmoored from her physical being yet intimately connected to herself, to him. Then he sighs and tightens his arms around her and the movement is enough to tip her over the edge she hardly knew she was approaching. Sound rushes back into her ears, motion to her limbs, sensation… _Oh... oh, God._ He swallows her cries with his mouth and offers his own to her and they end panting, all sloppy kisses and hands stroking each other's faces. He lets out a final sound that's half moan and half sigh and clasps her tightly to his chest.

They separate, but there's no question of her going back to the sofa. Tom lies back, opens his arms, and Sybil nestles into them. Her last thought before sleep takes her is how nice he smells.

When she next opens her eyes there's sunlight filtering through the window shade and the bed is empty except for her. Tom must be out delivering his client's car. Her limbs are heavy and she feels pleasantly wrung out; a bit sore, but it's a satisfying ache, like she's just started a new exercise program. She considers getting up but can't quite make herself do it. After a few moments, she lets her eyelids fall shut.

The aroma of bacon frying eases her out of sleep. Over the hiss of hot grease, she can hear Tom whistling. She goes into the bathroom, and in the mirror she sees that she has a couple of love bites on her neck and more on her breasts. Once she's done an abbreviated morning routine she joins Tom in the kitchen, where he's doing a veritable fry-up. Sybil notes that he has shaved; she wonders whether it's in her honor or because he had to see a customer.

"Morning," she says. After a couple of seconds' vacillation she goes up and gives him a kiss on the cheek.

He grins and reciprocates on the corner of her mouth. It's all very domestic. "Sleep well?"

"Wonderfully."

"I bought some things while I was in town. I thought we could have a real breakfast before I started work."

"Cheers, it smells gorgeous." She looks around. "Shall I put the kettle on?"

"Already did." He motions to the worktop, where there's an electric kettle that actually looks as though it was manufactured in this century. "Should be ready pretty soon." It boils as if on cue, and Sybil finds the mugs and tea bags and fixes them each a cup. A quarter of an hour later they settle at the table with more food than Sybil thinks two people could possibly consume: eggs and rashers and beans, fried potatoes and sliced guava and toast with jam. She eats about a fourth of it, but Tom has no problem with the rest. When they're finished Tom once again refuses to let her do the washing up, so she dries. The whole time she's telling herself that she can't just let him go out and work on her car like nothing's happened. They've put away the last dish before she plucks up the nerve to speak.

"Tom." She watches her fingertips run along the scarred laminate edge of the worktop. "Last night…" She's not sure how to say it, or even quite what it is she wants to express. "It was, erm…"

"Intense," he supplies. The word pitches up just enough at the end that it could be a question or a statement.

"Yeah." She lets out her breath and raises her eyes to find his waiting, wide and guileless and so, so blue. _Guh. _"It was really great," she says lamely. "You were brilliant." _Stop. Just stop._

But if he takes offense that she's talking about the best sex she's ever had as if it were a well played game of cards, he doesn't give any sign. "You were amazing," he says, smiling. He draws closer until his face is half an inch away from hers, tilting his head so their noses don't bump. "You _are _amazing." Their lips brush together. They taste each other's mouths. Sybil lays her hand on his chest, feeling the accelerating thud of his heart, and he murmurs, "I think the car can wait a little."

-ooo-

Once the last condom in Sybil's packet has been used—playfully this time, with much giggling and more than a few mischievous slaps and pinches on either side—Tom groans and gets up. "If I don't get to work soon, you're never going to get a look at those mountains."

Sybil feels muddled. She very much appreciates that Tom isn't making assumptions or trying to persuade her not to go, but at the same time part of her wishes he would. She hopes he's not just waiting for her to leave. But it's mad to think it could go anywhere—this, the two of them, _whatever this is._ They don't even live in the same hemisphere. The fact that she's even thinking that far about a man she met yesterday astounds her. _Just a bit of fun,_ she reminds herself. _Maybe all the guys in Australia are like this when you get to know them. I should buy more condoms when I get into a town._

Even so, instead of remaining in the house she accompanies her bit of fun into the garage and settles into the office chair, reading with her feet on the desk while he works. He found a couple more little things yesterday, he tells her, but he's got the parts and they're easy fixes.

"I want to pay you what's fair," she says.

"Don't be daft."

"I'm serious." Sybil makes sure she sounds like it.

"We'll talk about it once your car's up and running again. All right?"

He finishes with it around two in the afternoon, and invites Sybil to have lunch with him before she sets off. After her late and lavish breakfast she's not got much appetite. Not for food, anyway; she's almost shocked at the enhancing effect the last twenty-four hours has had on her libido. "I wouldn't mind having a shower," she says.

They shower, together this time, and Sybil flicking a bit of water at Tom quickly escalates into him kneeling in front of her with her back pressed against the side of the house. She's never had a lover—_lover_, the word makes her want to giggle _But I suppose that's what he is_—who was so enamored of cunnilingus. Not that she's complaining.

Afterward they go into the house and Sybil re-dresses and re-bandages Tom's hand. It looks like it's going to heal up just fine. She packs her things and sets her suitcase in the kitchen by the back door. Tom's sitting at the table. "Cup of tea?" he offers. It's blazing out, but she accepts anyway.

_I don't want to go._

She's been fighting the certainty all morning: because it's too fast and too intense, because this isn't what she's here for. And it's his house. If he wants her to stay, he'll ask her.

"What do I owe you?" She asks. "For the car."

Instead of answering he gets up and goes over to a drawer, comes back with a pad of notepaper and a biro. He writes down _Tom Branson_ and an email address and tears it off. "Here. I'm not on Facebook or any of that, but you can email me if ye like."

Sybil stares at it, thinking _God I didn't even know his surname_. "Crawley," she bursts out. "I'm Sybil Crawley."

He puts on a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. "It's been nice knowing you, Sybil Crawley."

Neither of them moves for what feels like an age. He clears his throat, a delicate sound that breaks the silence like a shot. "You know," he says, "We might not have mountains, but there are some lovely natural features that aren't far away at all."

"Oh?" She looks at him and he's studying her, light in his eyes.

"Yep. Hidden gems, you might say. You kind of have to know where they are… or be with someone who does."

"And I suppose you're familiar with them." She's having a hard time keeping her mouth straight.

"I've explored the area fairly thoroughly, yeah."

"Well, it does sound enticing." She lets a teasing note come into her voice. "I'd need a place to stay, though. There aren't many hostels out here."

"I think we can sort that out." He smiles, his eyes touchingly sincere. "Stay here just as long as you like. I'd be glad to have you."

Slowly, she stands up and goes over to him. He turns in his chair so she can come close and drape her hands over his shoulders. "I'd be glad to have you as well," she says in her most sultry voice, a bit smug at her own daring.

Looking up at her, he takes her hand and brings it to his lips. Then he tugs her down so she's sitting on his lap. "You can have me right now if you like." They kiss, a soft touch of the lips that soon heats up. "God, I just want more and more of you," he mutters almost to himself.

Her hands are at his belt when she realizes. "Oh, bollocks."

His mouth pauses on her neck. "What?"

"We haven't got any more condoms."

He grins and takes her by the waist, propelling her gently to her feet. Without a word he walks into his bedroom. A drawer opens and closes, and he comes out with a small box which he hands to Sybil. "I, ah, bought those while I was in town."

She raises an eyebrow. "A dozen?"

"It was that or single ones. That's all they sold in the shop." He shrugs with a rather devilish smile which makes that thrill shoot through Sybil's lower body again. "I'm an optimistic sort."

"Well." Sybil tears the box open and takes out one individually wrapped condom. "I suppose we'd best get to work."

* * *

_AN#2: I need another WIP like I need a hole in the head, but I have some ~ideas~ about Sybil and Tom's backstories (and what happens next) that might need to come out. I'd love to know if y'all are interested in coming along for the ride. _


	3. Chapter 3:It's Like They Want Us to Fail

_AN: Thanks so much for the reviews! Love your theories on what brought Tom to Australia, but I can't give it away too soon. Now we go back and see why Sybil is between jobs. I've gotten most of my knowledge of the inner workings of the health professions from _Scrubs _and a little bit of Googling, so I apologize in advance for the inaccuracies. I've taken some liberties with disciplinary procedures regarding nurses in the UK, and the hospitals mentioned in this chapter are fictional. _

_Thanks to cassiemortmain for the beta!_

* * *

Hackney Central Hospital, Hackney, London: Mid-December (three months previous)

It was a day like any other when Sybil's life as she knew it began to unravel.

That shift she was scheduled to scrub in on two surgeries. She had every reason to believe the first would go as smoothly as melting butter: they had a young and previously healthy patient, and that particular surgical team had gone over a year without a single serious complication. It was a record that those in their orbit looked upon with mingled admiration and disbelief; Dr. Tom Bellasis, the assisting resident and one of Sybil's oldest friends, had told her the other day how he'd got wind of a pool among the interns taking bets on when the "Dream Team" would kill somebody.

"By jove, Creeps, it's like they want us to fail," he'd complained over his pint that night after work. He and Sybil (or "Creeps"—as in "Creepy Crawley"—a nickname that had stuck between them since they were kids) were having their customary winding-down drink or six at the pub a few blocks from hospital. That night it had been closer to six; it'd been a stressful day.

"They don't want us to fail," Sybil had sighed. "It's just gallows humor. And stop saying 'by jove.' You sound like somebody's grandpa."

Now, sobered up and scrubbed in with the anesthetist telling the patient to count back from a hundred, failure was the furthest thing from Nurse Crawley's mind. As the attending physician, Dr. Clarkson was nominally the operating surgeon, but before things got started he handed the reins to his resident. Dr. Bellasis took them with confidence, though he had only performed a thoracotomy a handful of times.

"All right," he said, slightly muffled through his surgical mask. "Nurse Barrow, could you remind us of the particulars, please."

Thomas Barrow stepped up in his stiff-shouldered way. He and Sybil had had their moments, but she liked to think they'd come to a place of mutual respect—even a sort of friendship—and she didn't know a circulating nurse with a sharper eye than he had. "Twenty-nine-year-old female with pleural empyema due to pneumonia. No medical problems before presenting to her GP with a severe cold on…" he checked the chart. "27th November. Checked into hospital with difficulty breathing on 8th December, diagnosed with pneumonia…" He went on to summarize the treatments attempted, the infection, the decision to schedule surgery to remove the bacteria and fluid buildup in the woman's lungs.

"And the name?" Sybil asked when he'd finished.

"What?" Thomas's air of faintly put-upon surprise in response to that question never altered, even though Sybil asked every time.

"The patient's name, Nurse Barrow? I always like to remember we're operating on a person."

"Swire," he bit out. "Lavinia Swire. Would you like her middle name?"

"No, thanks." She gave him a brilliant smile, making sure her eyes crinkled up so he could see it, and they got down to business. For a little while the team didn't speak except to make a comment or to issue a request or instruction. There was no noise except the various monitors and machines, the clink of instruments on trays, and the background music: a Mendelssohn symphony, Dr. Clarkson's choice.

After a while their tongues began to loosen during slack periods. Dr. Clarkson told them about an interesting case he'd seen during his residency of a paraplegic who had spontaneously regained function in his lower limbs. Sybil asked after the anesthetist's family and was treated to a harangue on the pitfalls of signing one's seven-year-old daughter up for ballet lessons. There was a brief lull, and Dr. Bellasis spoke up. "Nurse C."

"Yes, Dr. B?" She kept her tone neutral, but beneath the mask Sybil felt her mouth curve in a smile. Outside of work it was _Creeps_ and _Tick, _which was Tom's childhood nickname; in a professional context it was _nurse _and _doctor_, with surnames if differentiation was needed. By unspoken agreement, _Nurse C_ and _Dr. B_ were reserved for the no-man's-land of informal talk on hospital grounds.

"I happened to speak with my mate Hank Clare yesterday."

"Oh?"

"You remember, the one doing his residency at St Ursula's?"

"Of course."

"With the cracking sense of humor? You haven't lost his number, have you?"

Sybil hazarded a glance up at Tick, whose eyes remained fixed on his work. "I'm sure he's hilarious, but I've told you I don't date surgeons." She lifted a brow. "Too full of themselves."

"With respect, Nurse C, I strongly object to that generalization."

"Present company excepted, of course."

"Thank you."

"Anyway, between my granny and my sister I've fended off enough offers of blind dates to fill my diary for the next year. I'm afraid you'll have to do better if you want to run with the champions."

"Hank was rather disappointed you hadn't rung him. He said you looked like a 'fittie' in your profile photo on Facebook."

Sybil pursed her lips to contain an unprofessional guffaw. "I'll take that as proof that I don't need to lower my standards."

There was a sigh from behind Tick's mask. "I think you may be right in this case."

Sybil couldn't resist: "I do hope the right fittie for your friend is out there somewhere, Dr. B."

"As do I, Nurse C. And I hope he finds her soon, so he can stop badgering me to hook him up with my colleagues."

"I hate to interrupt the society column," came a disdainful drawl from Thomas, "but patient's BP is dropping." Indeed, the blood pressure monitor had begun to sound.

All in a day's work. "Thank you, Nurse Barrow." Tick's reply was bone dry. "Hm… Ah, here we are. Just a bit of a nick, we'll have it under control in a jiffy… Nurse Crawley, suction please—"

Then everything went to hell.

-ooo-

Twenty-eight hours later, Sybil waited in an uncomfortable chair in the Director of Nursing's office anteroom and stared at her hands. _Steady as a fucking rock,_ an American-accented male voice bawled inside her head. It took her a moment to figure out where she'd heard it: _Leaving Las Vegas_. _Ah, _she thought, _the one with the guy who's lost everything and drinks himself to death. Appropriate. _

She hadn't lost anything yet, apart from Lavinia Swire's life. But given the way things had gone in the operating theatre, she couldn't shake a sense of foreboding. From one point of view it was a perfectly explicable incident, could've happened to anyone. From another it was a series of escalating and entirely preventable errors. Either way Ms. Swire's loved ones had entrusted her to the hands of Dr. Bellasis, Nurse Crawley, and the rest of the team, and they would never again see her alive.

_It happens to everyone at some point. _Now the voice in Sybil's head belonged to Isobel, her sister's mother-in-law and Sybil's inspiration for entering the nursing profession in the first place. The words referred to the loss of a patient. It was unavoidable, and it _had _happened to Sybil on multiple occasions; just never in the middle of surgery, and never as a result of her action.

_My inaction_.

She didn't know why she hadn't spoken up immediately. Maybe it was because the surgeon was her friend; but she'd never before had a problem telling Tick when he was about to make a hash of things. Maybe she'd been lulled by five hundred successful surgeries, and couldn't quite believe the five hundred and first was going wrong even as she saw it happen in front of her eyes.

Maybe she'd just choked.

It wasn't unheard of. Nurses who'd been practicing much longer than Sybil had been known to freeze up in a crisis for no good reason. At any rate, her paralysis hadn't lasted long—less than half a minute—but that was long enough for things to become dire and for Tick, who'd never had someone bleeding out in his hands before, to panic. Sybil couldn't help but think that a few words from her at the right time would have prevented the entire tragic business. She didn't have a medical degree, but she had more experience in the OT and she'd kept at least one other resident from making a similar error to the one Tick had. It didn't occur to her to think that Dr. Clarkson or Nurse Barrow could have—should have—done the same thing. She was the first assistant; it was her role, and she'd failed in it.

After a debriefing that seemed to go on forever she'd been sent home, told to get some sleep. That was a laugh: she'd spent several numb hours in front of the television (she couldn't have said what she'd watched if you'd put a gun to her head) and then gone to bed only to have the day's scene replay every time she shut her eyes. It was different each time; by the time light began to leak into the sky she was no longer quite sure of the actual sequence of events. As the morning rush hour whirred into action outside she'd stood at her window, eyes burning with fatigue, and watched the traffic go by without her.

Midafternoon they'd rung and asked her to come in and see the Director of Nursing, presumably to learn her fate. Sybil expected no quarter from her supervisors. They took the death of a patient in surgery seriously—as they should—and mistakes had been made. A reprimand was the least she could hope for; she might be demoted, maybe even put on administrative leave while the investigation went on.

_Just accept whatever they've decided as calmly as you can,_ she told herself. _And don't let her make you cry._

Director of Nursing Miriam Bennett had brought tears to Sybil's eyes more than once, and in much less dire circumstances. Put bluntly, the woman didn't like her. Not _her _exactly; more the fact that she came from wealth and the aristocracy. Even though most of the Crawley family money had long since gone, and Sybil's father had done a pretty thorough job of losing what remained. Even though hardly anybody, least of all Sybil, cared about pedigree any longer. The die had been cast the moment Nurse Bennett found out about Sybil's background. She'd been born working class in the Midlands, struggled hard to get where she was, and had an ingrained suspicion of the children of privilege.

_I'll give you a trial,_ she'd said at the interview, but her tone of voice said that she fully expected young Nurse Crawley to crash and burn despite her excellent marks in school, her successful prior work experience and glowing references. Sybil hadn't had much day-to-day interaction with the director, but when they did cross paths she always got the sense that Nurse Bennett was surprised (and more than a little affronted) that Sybil hadn't yet borne out her prediction.

She'd waited a good forty-five minutes by the time the director strode in, mouth set in a thin line and white coat flapping about her knees. She didn't even turn her head in Sybil's direction, just blew through the anteroom and into her office quickly enough to create a breeze that made the ornaments tinkle on the Christmas tree by the entrance. Just before closing her office door behind her she turned round as if she'd just noticed Sybil sitting there. "Nurse Crawley, please come in," she said, barely opening her lips.

She remained in the doorway as Sybil approached it, forcing her to wait an awkward few seconds to enter the room. Nurse Bennett was a statuesque woman, nearly six feet tall, and her smooth silver coif and sensible clogs—a holdover from when she'd spent her days walking the wards instead of sitting in board meetings—added another couple of inches. _Intimidating _was an understatement, even without the cool green eyes that assessed Sybil with all the sympathy that might be afforded a faulty part in a machine. There was something else in her gaze too: Sybil swore she saw a buried spark of triumph.

Her heart quickened with indignation. _She can't be _glad_. Can she?_

Finally the director moved behind her desk, motioning for Sybil to take the chair in front of it. When they were seated, the older woman and the younger one faced each other in silence until Sybil broke it with a cough. Nurse Bennett's mouth creased in a pained smile. "Well, Nurse Crawley, I do wish we were meeting in different circumstances."

"As do I." Sybil nodded and glanced into her lap.

"Unfortunate as the situation may be, though, I can't say that I'm surprised."

Sybil's head came up, temper rising hot in her chest. "Nurse Bennett—"

The director merely raised her voice. "It was only a matter of time before a lapse of this magnitude occurred. I argued from the first against placing you and Dr. Bellasis on a team together, with your…" she cleared her throat, a delicate little sound that managed to contain a world of innuendo. "_prior association,_ but—"

Sybil couldn't ignore that. "Dr. Bellasis and I are friends," she said, laying emphasis on the last word. "But we've certainly never allowed it to interfere with our work, in fact I should say it's made us better—"

The director held up a manicured hand for silence. "When he was debriefed, Dr. Stephens seemed to think that the two of you might have been distracted at the time the initial error took place."

Dr. Stephens, the anesthetist, who'd just finished going on about his daughter's bloody dance lessons. Sybil fought to keep calm. "Every team engages in conversation during an operation. It helps keep our minds from wandering, builds camaraderie—you know that." There was a pleading note in her voice that she needed to nip in the bud; showing weakness wouldn't help any more than losing her temper.

"But in this case, your inattention left you ill prepared for the unexpected," Nurse Bennett went on, "and contributed to the chain of events that led to a patient's death."

"We weren't inattentive. It was just…" Sybil withered under the director's flat gaze, unable to come up with anything to say that might satisfy her. "I'm not trying to avoid responsibility," she said finally, quietly. "I accept it, fully. I should have been a better resource for Dr. Bellasis and a stronger advocate for the patient."

"I agree," Nurse Bennett returned crisply. "I would never have thought you of all people should be too intimidated by hierarchy to speak up when you saw something going amiss."

_First I'm distracted, then I'm intimidated?_ But Sybil let that pass. "How did the family take it?" She asked.

The director sighed. "Actually, Ms. Swire hadn't any. I suppose that's for the best in this situation." _No one to sue us. _"But I'm afraid we must come to the point, Nurse Crawley, as unpleasant as it might be for both of us."

Sybil lifted her chin, fighting the urge to bite her lower lip. Her hands, folded in her lap, tightened until the knuckles went white.

"It was initially recommended that you be dismissed for cause—"

She gasped in spite of herself. "_What?_" She felt dizzy. _Dismissed?_ And after a day's investigation. That wasn't how these things were normally handled. _Dismissed. It isn't fair! This is not fair,_ her brain yammered, and it was all Sybil could do to keep the words from flying out of her mouth. But they wouldn't help. She'd sound like a sulky teenager and it wouldn't alter the verdict.

The hand came up again, coral-varnished nails gleaming. "But due to mitigating factors, including Nurse Barrow's attestation in support of your skills and commitment to the profession, we've decided that you will be allowed to resign."

Sybil sagged back in her chair. She couldn't look at Nurse Bennett; she didn't want to see the woman's eyes glinting at her above that horrid fake-pitying smirk. "And if I refuse?" Sybil asked, once her heart had stopped racing. "What happens then?"

She could have guessed the answer, but it still came like a slap in the face. "In that case you will be suspended and referred to the Nursing and Midwifery Council for lack of competence. Any action you take after that would be down to you and your lawyer—" Nurse Bennett made a disdainful little noise in her throat—"But there's a strong possibility you'd be struck off the register and be banned from practicing again."

"Unless the suspension was found to be wrongful."

"That is extremely unlikely, Nurse Crawley. Even for someone of your resources, which I understand are not as extensive as one might think."

She'd had time to look into Sybil's finances, but not to conduct the sort of investigation this action warranted. _She must really want to be rid of me. _

Nurse Bennett went on, her voice empty of either malice or kindness: she was simply stating the way things were. "Think about it. This way you'll be able to get another job. You can start again."

Sybil looked up, met her eye. "So you'd send off a nurse who supposedly caused a patient's death to work somewhere else."

The director spread her hands and widened her eyes. "Nurse Crawley—Sybil—anyone who's worked in the medical profession knows that sometimes things happen that are beyond our control. But when a strong young woman dies on the operating table, there are always those who will look for someone to blame." If Sybil hadn't seen the look in her eyes earlier, it would have been a reasonably convincing pantomime of being sorry. "We must consider the good of the hospital."

_So I'm to be the scapegoat._ Sybil sighed. "What'll happen to Ti—Dr. Bellasis?"

The green eyes probed her. "That will be down to his supervisors. Given what's happened in similar situations, it could be anything from a reprimand and additional training requirements up to dismissal from his program." She paused for a long moment. "Is there another side to the story? One we've not yet heard?"

_Throw Tick under the bus and maybe it'll go better for you,_ Sybil heard. Not bloody likely. "No." She swallowed. "Based on many hours spent working alongside him, my opinion is that Dr. Bellasis is one of the most talented surgical residents we've had in the time I've been here. He made a mistake, but he is absolutely competent and should be kept on if at all possible."

"Your opinion will be given due consideration, Nurse Crawley." Which was to say, very little. "But I doubt keeping this case open would make things any easier on him." The director cleared her throat. "I can give you until tomorrow at five to make your decision," she said. "But if we haven't received your letter of resignation by then, we shall have to—"

"You'll have it," Sybil said. She wasn't sure when she'd given up; sometime between the explicit threat to her livelihood and the veiled one to her friend.

"Thank you." There was real relief in the director's voice. "It really will be best for everyone if we can learn from this case and put it behind us. I understand how difficult this must be for you—"

"Please don't, Nurse Bennett," Sybil broke in. She had to force the words out. Her limbs seemed to weigh a ton each. She dragged herself to her feet, opened the door, and walked out without a backward glance.

-ooo-

She was fine for the first few days. Once she'd recovered from the initial shock of losing her job, Sybil decided that there was absolutely no point in wallowing. She'd been the target of a vindictive supervisor; that wasn't anything to do with her. She'd made a mistake and a woman had died; that was harder to overcome, but overcome it she would. So she'd gone out with Tick and her best girlfriend Gwen for too many drinks and a deeply satisfying verbal skewering of Hackney Central Hospital's upper management, slept off her hangover, and started looking for a new job.

In the week before Christmas, doubt began to creep in. It wasn't only that no one responded to her applications. Nurse Bennett's treatment of her had left a foul taste in her mouth that was more than hurt feelings. When it came down to it, the woman had been willing to destroy Sybil's career over little more than her personal dislike of her. Two years of exemplary service and the testimony of Sybil's colleagues hadn't been able to save her; who was to say something similar wouldn't happen in her next job, or the one after that?

She began to think that maybe the director had been right. Nurse Bennett been in the profession for decades, it stood to reason she'd be able to spot the bad apples a mile off. Maybe she'd seen something no one else had. Certainly Sybil hadn't; if asked beforehand whether she could have imagined herself freezing up in the theatre, she would have laughed and said _That's what training is for!_ Truly, at that stage many aspects of her job were automatic, muscle memory. Everyone had always admired her serene competence: Nurse Crawley the unflappable. But what happened once could happen again. She fretted, especially when she heard that Tick had only received a warning and been required to take extra training before operating again. She was glad—of course she was—but it made her wonder all the more why she'd lost her place when he hadn't.

Going home for Christmas didn't help. Her parents had been against her becoming a nurse at all, and Sybil imagined they'd take this as a vindication of their view that she should have either married well or gone into marketing. So she pasted on a bright smile, shared as little as possible of the circumstances which had led to her unemployment, and for three days tried to enjoy her family for who they were.

The real crash came as soon as she arrived back in London. She went from submitting multiple job applications a day to one or two, and then to none. She didn't see the point, even though she knew that the longer she spent out of work the more her skills would degrade. _No one's going to hire me anyway. _With shift work, her sleep schedule had always been erratic, but now it was even less predictable. Some nights she'd toss and turn until she finally gave up and switched on the telly; others she'd fall down a steep slope into unconsciousness, to wake fourteen hours later with a head full of cobwebs. She stopped making sure she left the flat every day. She stopped answering her phone. Some part of her knew she was doing exactly what she hadn't wanted to: wallowing. She was letting this get the better of her. She didn't care.

-ooo-

Bethnal Green, London: January

She should have expected a visit. Mary wasn't one to let things lie, especially not where her baby sister was concerned, and Sybil had been dodging her calls since Christmas. As much as she wanted to ignore them, the hurried knock on the door and the concerned voice behind it weren't going away until she dealt with them.

"Sybil?" Mary's voice was muffled. "I know you're there, I can hear the telly. Open up, darling."

Sybil sighed and pushed back the duvet. It was half past three in the afternoon, but her sleek wall bed was folded down and she was in it, having spent the last four hours streaming old episodes of _Top Gear_ and trying to muster the gumption to take a shower.

She winced as her bare feet touched the icy floorboards. The buildings in these gentrifying neighborhoods had been renovated with an eye to profit rather than quality, and the place was probably as drafty as it had been when it was a tenement. The insistent rap on the door came again, along with another "Sybil?" That was Edith. _Good God,_ Sybil thought, _they've actually joined forces._

"Coming," she said, turning off the TV before undoing the locks. To her credit, Mary hardly even blanched at Sybil's tousled hair and pale unwashed face, sweeping into the flat without waiting for an invitation. Sybil chuckled humorlessly. "Come right in. Cup of tea?"

"That'd be lovely, cheers," said Mary briskly. Every hair was in place, as usual. She wore an understated and no doubt fabulously expensive ensemble: slim-fitting charcoal trousers and a cream silk blouse under a cabernet belted wool overcoat, which she took off and flung onto the sofa. Her eyes raked the flat's single room, the reading matter and dirty dishes and discarded clothes spread over nearly every available surface. "When's the last time you had someone in here to tidy up?" Mary still lived like they had money. And she did, sort of; Matthew was moderately successful as a solicitor and Sybil knew there had been a small inheritance from his father.

"I clean up after myself," she answered, shutting the door behind Edith. Her middle sister looked smart as well, though in a softer style, all ruched felt and downy suede. She gave Sybil an awkward little smile and hovered in front of the door with her hands cupping her elbows.

"You ought to sack your maid, then," said Mary dryly. Though Sybil had offered the tea Mary was the one who went over to the kitchenette, filled the kettle, and turned it on.

Sybil drifted over in her lightly perfumed wake. "How's Matthew?" She didn't ask why Mary was in London; she was always gallivanting down from Manchester at weekends. And Sybil had already resigned herself to an afternoon of bucking up. She couldn't pretend she didn't need it, not with them having seen the state of her flat. "And Michael?" she asked, glancing at Edith.

"Michael's fine," Edith said.

"Matthew's lovely as ever." Mary rummaged for tea bags, making a face when her hand touched the sticky worktop. "Sybil…"

"I know what this looks like. And I am a little down just now…"

Mary turned and gave her a penetrating look. "A _little _down? Darling, I've never seen you like this."

"...But I'll be all right. Really."

"Mum and Dad were rather worried when you didn't come for the New Year party," said Edith.

Sybil sighed. "I haven't been in a party mood."

"You don't say. I thought you were going to grind your teeth down to stumps, the way you grimaced through Christmas." Mary's face softened. "Oh, darling, I don't mean to be harsh." She opened her arms, grasping Sybil by the wrists and pulling her into a hug. "I know how much you loved being a nurse."

"I still _am _a nurse!" Sybil sputtered into her shoulder.

"Of course." Mary held her at arms' length. "But Sybil…" her brow furrowed. "Don't take this the wrong way, but I think you may have over-identified with your work."

Sybil snorted. "Because I cared about it? Because I was committed to it?"

"Because not being able to do it's sent you into a complete tailspin." The kettle boiled and Mary turned to fix their tea, but not before Sybil caught the significant look that passed between her sisters.

Edith cleared her throat. "But that's not why we're here."

"It's not?" Sybil blinked. She'd taken it for granted that Mum had freaked out and sent them over when she couldn't get Sybil on the phone. "Then why?"

Mary handed her a steaming mug that had _York Alumni Association _printed on the side. "Let's go and sit down."

Sybil's heart started to pound. "What is it?"

"Sybil…" Edith took her gently by the elbow. "Come on."

They didn't keep her in suspense for long. "It's Grandmama," said Mary.

"Oh God." Sybil tightened her hands around her cup to keep them from shaking. She looked from Mary to Edith; their downcast eyes hinted at her worst fears.

Mary confirmed them. "She's died, darling."

"When?"

"Yesterday." Mary coughed. "We left voicemails. And texted you."

"Oh God." She attempted to set her mug on the table and it tipped over. Tea spilled, soaking the newspapers underneath, and the three of them stared at it dumbly. Finally Edith got up to fetch a tea towel and Sybil scrubbed her hands over her face. "I've been so selfish. I'm sorry."

Mary laid a hand on her arm. "Don't be."

Edith mopped up the spill and crumpled the sodden newsprint into a ball. "We'll have to go over for the funeral."

"Of course we will." Sybil pushed her hair off her forehead and gave a rueful chuckle. "One thing about being unemployed, it does make it easy to take off at a moment's notice."

-ooo-

Waterhouse Restaurant, Hackney, London: February

"You're mad," said Gwen with a decisive stab into her fish. "Australia. On your own." She popped a forkful of plaice into her mouth and chewed, shaking her head.

Sybil gave a rueful smile, running a finger round the rim of her water glass and gazing out at the canal. She'd expected a reaction something like this. Gwen had come a long way from the shy girl Sybil had befriended almost by force their first year in uni: she was full of opinions and could always be counted upon to give hers, no matter how difficult it might be to hear. Though she'd long since got past her self-esteem issues, she retained the hard-as-nails practicality instilled by her mother. Gwen's assertiveness was a mixed blessing at this stage, especially since Sybil had already booked her flight. She'd done it the day after the reading of her grandmother's will.

She already knew the trip was a stupid idea on its face, which was why she hadn't yet told anyone but Gwen. What she _should _do was put the money in the bank with the rest of her rapidly dwindling savings, pull on her big-girl boots, and recommit to finding a job. Any job, anywhere she could. This adventure would only postpone the inevitable reckoning… only now she'd have a suntan when she got evicted from her flat and had to move back in with Mum and Dad.

"What're you going to _do?_" Gwen asked when she'd swallowed her mouthful. "I mean, you're not exactly a beach kind of person." She cocked her head. "Or a roughing-it kind of person. I can't see you camping in the… the outback, or wherever. Do people camp there? Aren't there snakes and crocodiles and things?"

Sybil shrugged. "I'm really not sure what kind of person I am any longer. I rather fancy sitting on a beach for a couple of weeks, actually." The thing was, she could _hear _Grandmama saying the words from the will, as surely as if she'd read them out herself. _If we haven't made it Down Under before I kick the bucket, kid, you ought to take that money and go before you quit dreamin' about it. _She could see the twinkle in her eye. "I'll just go wherever I feel like; I don't plan on straying too far off the beaten path."

"Why not?" Gwen chortled. "In for a penny, in for a pound. Only don't forget your bow and arrow, just in case."

"You could come with me," said Sybil. "Thelma and Louise, we'll be."

"You do remember how that film ended, don't you? Though it might be worth it if I got to shag Brad Pitt." Gwen tapped her lips with the pad of her forefinger. "Nah, I haven't got a bow and arrow. Or an inheritance." She was only joking; her smile was soft, but her eyes cut to Sybil sharply with the next: "You are planning to come back, aren't you?"

Gwen knew her friend almost better than Sybil knew herself. In the furthest corner of her mind, Sybil had considered emigrating. Just going: finding a job waiting tables in some beach town, taking things at a slower pace, living simply. Acquiring a new, hybrid accent, learning how to surf, letting the sun darken her skin and lighten her hair. Becoming someone new. Eventually she could get registered as a nurse there; or maybe not. The idea pulled at her.

But in the end she'd bought a return ticket. "Of course I'm coming back! Who else would listen to you whinge about your job if I didn't?" Gwen was personal assistant to a banking executive, dazzlingly competent and unfailingly discreet about her boss's quirks (the man wouldn't eat anything that had been packaged in plastic and went through fourteen new pairs of grey socks a week) with everyone but Sybil.

"Then you haven't gone completely round the bend." Gwen smiled, but there was a shadow of concern in her eyes that said she was at least a fraction serious.

"I'm fine," Sybil assured her. "I'm only having a laugh."

"I wish I could come, if only to look after you." the concern came to the forefront and the little bit of a smile still remaining on Gwen's face faded. "You will be careful?" She eyed Sybil until she got an assenting nod. "I still don't understand why you're doing this. It doesn't even sound like fun, traveling alone."

"I think some time alone is what I need." Impulsively Sybil reached across the table and grabbed Gwen's hand. "You're lovely for worrying, but you don't need to. I've taken a course in self defense and I'm up to date on all my vaccinations." She smiled crookedly.

They finished their lunch and embraced, promising to see each other again before Sybil left, and went their separate ways. It was bitterly cold, but Sybil walked instead of taking the bus home; she'd spent enough time in her flat to last her the rest of the year. She pulled her hat down over her ears, wrapped her coat more securely around herself, and strode rapidly through the grey streets.

As awful as it was to lose Grandmama, it had shaken Sybil out of her funk. Since returning from the funeral in New York she'd gone back to normal life; or as normal a life as one could have without a job. She still hadn't been up to throwing herself into a job search; she felt rather like a jilted lover thinking about dating again, only she didn't have the luxury of time in which to heal. The news that Grandmama had left Sybil and each of her sisters a more-than-respectable chunk of money couldn't have come at a better time. Her parents and sisters would be dismayed that Sybil had actually taken Grandmama's advice (and she could just see the look on Granny's face when she found out), but she had the idea they wouldn't be surprised.

And it wasn't their decision anyway. Sybil needed an escape. She needed to go somewhere she'd never been and see if she could fit into a different life, if only temporarily.

She could hardly wait.


	4. Chapter 4: If You Decide to Move On

_AN: Thanks as always for the reviews, and to cassiemortmain for the beta!_

* * *

Darling Downs, South East QLD, Australia: early April

Sybil's stomach has been rumbling for the past quarter of an hour, but she's perfectly comfortable where she is: in Tom's bed with Tom curled warm at her side, his hand lightly cupping her breast and his lips pressed to her shoulder. Finally there's a gurgle from her midsection that's loud enough for him to hear. "Mm," he murmurs, and his hand slips downward in a motion remarkably reminiscent of an expectant father feeling for his baby's kick. "I'm hungry too. Shall we get up?"

"Not yet." Sybil stretches luxuriously, rolling over to face him. He brushes her lips with his; she runs the tip of her tongue over his lower lip and he meets it with his own, stirring the desire that always seems just below the surface these days. "It's early yet," she says in what he calls her come-hither voice, low and smoky. She gives him her best come-hither stare even though he's already about as _hither _as he can get.

He chuckles huskily. "It's got to be past noon." He raises his head for a glance at the clock. "Jaysus, it's half one. We've slept and fucked away half the day." He doesn't sound as though he minds. "Weren't we meant to make a day-trip to your mountains?"

"We were," Sybil admits. "But _someone _couldn't seem to roll his arse out of bed at seven o'clock so we could leave in time to get a full day in."

He groans. "Seven is _early_. And _someone _started messing about with my dick and distracted me."

"I was trying to _wake _you!"

"Which you did, most enjoyably." He leans in for another kiss and his arms go around her, his hand sliding down her back to palm her arse and pull her flush with him. "Mm. I think I may be wanting some more wakening up."

"Oh, but you feel pretty awake to me—" The shrill burr of the landline cuts cleanly through their banter. Tom's hand pauses mid-squeeze, and Sybil's lips twist into a moue of disappointment almost without her realizing it.

He smiles ruefully. "Duty calls." Pushing himself up off the bed, he saunters into the kitchen, naked as the day he was born, to answer the telephone. His voice carries clearly the short distance down the hall: a question about a symptom, a confirmation of road directions. "I'll be there in forty minutes," he says, and rings off. A couple of seconds later he appears in the bedroom door looking vaguely apologetic. "It's a job."

"So I gathered." Sybil smiles and scoots to the side of the bed, swings her legs over.

"Starter, maybe the alternator." He pulls on boxers, jeans, T-shirt. "I won't be long. It's just in Jondaryan."

Sybil opens one of the two drawers Tom's cleared out for her in the chest and takes out a pair of knickers and a blue sleeveless shirt. She fishes her bra off the floor and puts it on. "I'll have some lunch ready when you get back."

"Thanks." He crosses the room, leans over, and kisses her. As he straightens up a slow grin comes to his face. "Leave me a note if you decide to move on while I'm gone."

Sybil gives him the same smile: it's been their running joke since the morning three weeks ago when Tom invited her to stay a bit longer. _Just as long as you like. _They joke because they're aware that what's happening with them is the stuff of romantic comedies, albeit without the inexplicably affordable luxury housing and tasteful fadeouts before the raunchy bits. And they joke because they know Sybil isn't just going to wake up one day and decide to continue north as if the time she's spent here has been nothing more than a hiccup in her holiday itinerary.

Sybil knows it, at least; they haven't discussed the future, apart from deciding what to buy in the market to take them through the next week. Tom's eyes remain unshadowed with any hint of dread at the thought of her leaving, and each time the words _if you decide to move on_ leave his mouth they do so with the same blithe insouciance as his frequent entreaties for her to join him in bed (or outdoors under the shower, or in the garage, or—once, and they nearly broke it—on the kitchen table). So far she's taken his behavior as a sign of optimism rather than indifference.

She gets two handfuls of his shirt front, uses them to pull herself up to standing, and gives him a lingering kiss. "You won't be rid of me that easily."

"Mm, do you promise?"

In answer she presses against him and slides her tongue into his mouth. Five heated minutes later, he moves away with a groan. "I'd better get on." He's still holding onto her hand, their arms stretching toward each other, and Sybil relishes the way he won't be the one to break contact.

After a few seconds she does it for him. "The sooner you go, the sooner you'll be back."

-o-

Back in England, twelve-hour shifts and a kitchen consisting of little more than a two-burner cooker and a square of worktop shoved against one wall suppressed most of Sybil's culinary urges. But it's different here. Even though the last three weeks have raced by—so quickly that she's surprised by the edge of autumn chill on the breeze that wafts in the open kitchen window—the days meander like a gourmand after a good meal, replete with hours in which to do whatever one pleases. Sybil has filled some of that time by taking over the majority of the meal preparation. Her grasp of cookery is hit or miss. As a tween she spent the school holidays badgering her parents' crotchety old cook Beryl for lessons in making crepes Suzette and Gruyère cheese puffs, but since then she's developed simpler and healthier tastes: less butter, more whole grains and leafy greens. During her first week here she went out and shopped for food while Tom was working on a car, returning with bags of fruits and veg and lean meats and some of the spices she'd noticed were missing, and Tom literally took two steps back when he came inside and opened the fridge. He seems to enjoy her efforts, uneven as they might be: he lavishes praise on whatever she puts in front of him and devours every morsel. She wonders how long it's been since someone cooked for him regularly.

Now, in honor of the cooling weather, she takes out a saucepan and begins to make a soup with what's left of the roasted chicken they had for dinner last night. She dumps a container of broth into the pan to heat up and juliennes half a carrot, slices a stalk of celery. When the broth boils she adds the veg and noodles, letting them cook while she strips the remaining meat off the chicken's bones. To go with the soup she'll make cheese and tomato sandwiches on wheat bread and feel quite wholesome.

While she works she hums and doesn't think about much of particular importance: what to cook for dinner, when she and Tom might make another attempt at a trip to the Bunya Mountains. Tom is in her mind almost constantly, even if only on the edges. It's only natural, considering how large a part he has had in her days and nights and the information overload that happens with any new relationship. She and Tom have learned plenty about each other: some of it significant, some not, all of it interesting as only the object of infatuation can be. Sybil now knows that Tom is ticklish on the soles of his feet but nowhere else, that he has a fairy ring of moles on his right lower back, that he doesn't like horror films because they give him nightmares. She knows that he's been working his way through the mouldering trove of midcentury paperbacks he found here when he moved in, but he's got a soft spot for Maeve Binchy because his mother used to read her books to him while he was growing up. He's told Sybil how he's always had a knack for fixing things, which he shares with his older brother Kieran (the one with the garage in Swindon). Unlike Kieran, Tom says, he doesn't have much of a head for business. Sybil could have figured that one out for herself: he still won't accept any money for fixing her car. _You're a special case,_ he protests whenever she ribs him about it.

He's quite politically engaged, a fact which surprises her when she notices it, considering his self-imposed isolation. He doesn't even have a computer, and he can't be bothered to shop for food more than once a fortnight , but he manages to buy a newspaper—sometimes two—almost every day. Sybil reads them while he works, and in the evenings he sits at the kitchen table and digests them front to back as though he's making a study of a foreign civilization. Which he is: he makes snarky comments on the Australian PM's latest stumble, shakes his head over the country's treatment of its Aboriginal people. Over dinner he and Sybil discuss what they've read. Often they agree (Sybil had no idea who Tony Abbott was before coming here, but she and Tom are one in their contempt of him) but privately she thinks it's more fun when they don't. The earnest way Tom tries to argue her round to his way of thinking charms her; his passion, when she doesn't immediately capitulate, inflames her. She already knew he was clever—she could see it in the set of his face, the look in his eyes—but as she gets to know him better she finds that he's much more than that. She wonders why he's wasting his intellect as an auto mechanic; then she's ashamed of her snobbery. Surely he has his reasons.

Which he has never even hinted at. In her growing knowledge of him there are blank spots, sudden and mysterious as the bands of static between radio stations when one drives through the mountains. She soon comes to realize that this is not mere carelessness on his part. There are things he doesn't talk about. Chief among them are his reasons for moving to this part of the world, but there are other landmines, which he steers around so deftly that Sybil barely notices the avoidance. He talks about Kieran and his mother readily enough, but he's said nothing to her about his father or his younger brother. He speaks of his home with longing, but does not mention the possibility of going back. The one time she asked if he talks to his family often, he mumbled something about the time difference and international phone rates and changed the subject.

But truth be told, the blanks don't concern her much. After all, it's not as if she's told _him _everything. He doesn't know that her father is an earl and that her mother has danced with Prince Charles. Like those tidbits, Sybil trusts that whatever information Tom might choose to withhold is not kept back out of any dishonesty.

And she trusts _him _completely. Sybil has always been quick to make friends, though the depth of her connection with Tom surprises her: she's even confided to him the whole sad story of how she came to be unemployed, including the parts that were her fault. She never imagined it would actually feel like the lifting of a weight, but it did. The rational part of Sybil's mind tells her that she and Tom are moving much too fast. In her heart, though, she feels as though they are traveling just the right speed.

Sybil has lunch on the table and she's putting things away when the tow truck roars up the drive, its load clattering behind it. It pulls up behind the garage next to Sybil's wagon and the ancient Daihatsu hatchback Tom uses on the rare occasions when he's going into town and doesn't have a vehicle to pick up or deliver. A minute later the kitchen door creaks open. "Have you been outside? It's gorgeous."

"Not yet." She tilts her head to accept the kiss he offers before he goes to wash his hands. "I'll have to come out and read after lunch." Instead of sitting down he comes back to her, wraps his arms around her, brushes her cheekbone with his lips. "Looks tasty," he murmurs.

She smiles. "Thanks." His mouth moves from her cheek to her neck, his hand pushing her hair out of the way. She bends her head to one side to allow him access. "Were you even talking about the food?"

"Mm. There's food?" His hand wanders down to her breast and Sybil feels a little thrill shoot through her when his thumb passes over her hardening nipple.

She puts on an affronted tone. "I'll have you know I slaved for minutes and minutes over a hot stove."

His other hand is at her hip, tugging up her skirt. "I'm trying to show my appreciation."

"You might show your appreciation by eating before it gets cold," she retorts, but his palm is warm on her arse, his voice vibrating on her skin as he gives a low groan of acknowledgement. He moves his hand around to her front, sliding it into the waist of her knickers, and Sybil sucks in her breath as his nimble fingers find their goal, gentle at first and then with more pressure. They move in circles, following her as she presses back against him. His breath quickens along with hers; it's one of the many things she loves about having sex with him, that they're each so turned on by giving pleasure to the other.

"Oh, God… Tom…"

In two minutes flat she goes from a rational person to a quivering mass of sensation. He barely whispers: _Ahh Christ I love how wet your pussy gets_ and it sounds oddly romantic from his mouth. Sexy, too: her legs tremble from the hunger in his voice, the waft of his hot breath against her ear. He changes the motion of his hand a little and her whole body begins to shake with the feeling that radiates from him, from her center. Her knees try to buckle; he tightens his free arm around her ribs, holding her up. "That's it, darling... that's it, love, come for me—" His voice eager, his fingers faster, harder, _harder _and her orgasm broadsides her, white stars bursting her thoughts apart as cries float out of her mouth.

_Lady Sybil does like her bit of rough._ She's got no idea where that thought comes from, and the look in Tom's eyes when she turns to meet them is anything but boorish. A well of emotion, deep and dark, she could fall in. He looks as though he can't quite believe she's real. "You're so _beautiful_," he murmurs with a hesitant swipe of his thumb over her cheekbone. She's breathing hard, her lips parted. Without conscious thought she lets them curve in a smile and his gaze sharpens, not so tender all of a sudden. She feels her face flush, her eyes widen; his darken even more in response. His heart skitters against hers. "Sybil…"

"I want you," she says. "Right here." They've started stashing condoms around the house, at least one or two in every room and the garage as well. Tom's arms are still draped around her but she only has to shift a little to one side to open the drawer where she knows there are a few. He captures her mouth with his while she fumbles, her fingers finally closing on the square of foil. Tom's hands knead her hips under her skirt, getting in her way while she tries to push his trousers down. "_Tom._"

"Sorry." He smiles and moves his hands up to her breasts. "Better?"

"Much."

He looks down, raising an eyebrow at the clothes now puddled around his ankles. "Am I getting undressed, or…?"

She's putting the condom on him. When she's done she gives him a kiss. "Your choice. You've got five minutes." She turns to face the worktop, bends over and rests her elbows on it, and throws him a saucy look over her shoulder. As lovely as their tender face-to-face sessions are, Sybil is not in the mood for that: she wants it fast and wild, him pressed against her back with his hands gripping her hips hard enough to chafe. She wants him to come apart as completely as he just made her do.

"Oh." He comes up against her and his tongue flicks against her ear. "Whatever you want," he murmurs, so full of lust it makes her shiver. He moves her skirt and knickers out of the way and they both groan as he pushes in.

She bites her lip, still trembling with little aftershocks as he moves within her. Quickly his moans become louder, uninhibited. "Ah, God, Sybil… Oh _feck_…" She wriggles her hips and his hands tighten on them. "I can't—_ohh_." He thrusts hard and she gasps, feeling another climax begin to spread through her just as Tom's hits him. Partly it's the movement, but most of it is his evident excitement. Before Tom, Sybil never had the experience of coming at the same moment as her partner; she's always maintained a mild skepticism that it happens as often as people say, or that it's anything special when it does. It's yet another thing her rational brain has been wrong about.

She's still a little dazed when he separates from her. She rests on her elbows and stares blindly at the backsplash, only dimly registering his hands tugging up her knickers, smoothing down her skirt. He starts putting himself back together. When she turns he's doing up his belt and he does that quick glance-up-and-smile that tugs at her heart. Impulsively she steps forward and embraces him. His arms come up around her but when she stretches up to kiss him he stops her, gazing into her eyes. He's got stars in his, as Gwen would say. No doubt Sybil does too; the feeling welling up in her chest has to spill out somewhere, and she's no good with words.

His eyes seem to get bigger as she looks into them, enlarging to fill her awareness. She and Tom breathe together and she thinks that in a different situation this would feel foolish, but it doesn't. Several times he draws in a breath, opens his lips as though he's going to speak, thinks better of it. Finally he pulls her closer and sighs, murmuring her name into her hair .

-ooo-

While he works on the car (it's the alternator, he tells her, which is worse than the starter for the car's owner but better for him) Sybil sits outside the garage in one of the teal chairs, reading the newspaper and watching the birds. When the shadows start to lengthen toward evening Tom comes out and drops into the chair next to hers.

"Lovely day to read outdoors."

"It would have been a lovely day for a hike in the mountains, too." Sybil's smile has edges on it, but they are not overly sharp. She's still thinking about the way they worked up an appetite for lunch. "Though then you'd have missed out on that job."

He shrugs. "It's not as if a few hundred dollars one way or the other is going to break me. I've been in tighter spots." She wonders if he's in more difficulty than he lets on and is glossing over it, out of shame or (more likely) pride. Though she hasn't told him of her provenance, he's assumed from the beginning that she comes from money. Probably he's picked up on the cues in her speech, the information she's shared about her family. He seldom mentions it except for the occasional lighthearted reference to her being posh.

"But look." He gestures to the northwest, pointing out the dark clouds massed there. "It's been raining over the Bunyas all day. If we'd gone we'd've been a right pair of drowned rats." He lolls his head sideways on the back of the chair to grin at her. "I liked what we ended up doing."

She smirks. "Me too."

They sit wrapped in comfortable silence. After a few minutes he reaches his hand across the brief distance that separates them, and she puts hers into it: they hold hands unceremoniously, as though they've been sharing this end-of-day time for years. The temperature slowly drops as the sun inches below the horizon. "It's nice to sit out here," Tom says. "I ought to have a firepit, for when it gets colder."

"Yeah, that'd be brilliant." Sybil isn't sure whether he's making an idle remark or if there's a reason he's bringing up future plans. He doesn't seem to be thinking of the fact that she's meant to be back in England by the time winter starts. She doesn't mention it.

-ooo-

Many hours after the sun sinks, they lie in his bed in what has become one of their habitual postures: Tom on his back, Sybil on her right side with her head pillowed on his chest. His left arm curls around her. While they wait for the slow tide of sleep to bear them out they indulge in languid caresses, aimless but fully alive to each other. His fingers catch gently at the ends of her hair; her hand drifts across his hip, tracing a line well traveled but not yet familiar. In three weeks she's seen him naked countless times, touched and tasted every part of his body, and yet the sense of _newness _hasn't worn off. She can tell it's the same for him; whenever they're within arm's length of each other he's touching her, even if it's only a casual hand on the small of her back, a quick brush of his lips on her bare shoulder. During sex he explores her body with all the zeal that comes from novelty, lingering on the hollows below her collarbones, the line that divides thigh and pelvis. It excites her to see how she can fascinate him, how he fascinates her.

If the physical mystery remains, that goes tenfold for everything else. Despite his open manner with her, the expressive face that furrows or stretches or crinkles with whatever emotion is passing through his heart, Tom remains a closed book in many ways. In her mind Sybil turns over more of the bits of knowledge she's gathered. He's from Dublin. He's the second of three boys, and his mother is a widow. Tom speaks of her oftener than anyone else he left behind, with admiration and affection. Yet Sybil has never seen him talk to her on the phone or write a letter or say he's off to the internet cafe in Dalby to email her. The few anecdotes he's shared from his earlier life make it clear that his upbringing was far from privileged, but he's mentioned having sat the higher level Leaving Cert exam in history, which seems ambitious for a future mechanic. This also makes her wonder. Did he plan on going to uni? He's never said. Did something happen to prevent him? Does it have anything to do with the hole in his chest?

Sybil has not pressed him for details. With his broad smile and copious appetites, Tom hardly fits the mold of a tragic figure, but it's plain that he carries some burden from his past. It's equally plain that he has no interest in sharing it with her. And why should he? There are secrets that couples don't tell each other even after years of marriage; she and Tom have known each other less than a month.

It strikes Sybil that she's thinking like this is a relationship and not a holiday fling, and how naturally this comes to her. And she's thinking like they have all the time in the world, when they don't. In the usual sort of romance, one where both partners live in the same place, sooner or later the pertinent facts would rise to the surface. But Sybil and Tom only have _sooner_. Even if she stays with him until the day her tourist visa expires, their connection cannot last forever in its current form.

She sighs and lets her hand drift up his torso until it encounters the scar on his chest, the round indentation unnaturally smooth under the sensitive pads of her fingers. When she touches it he doesn't quite wince; more of a stiffening. Her fingers stop moving. "Does it still hurt?"

"No." He shifts restively. "Well, occasionally, but deeper inside. They said it grazed bone. Shaved off a few splinters, I guess." He clears his throat. "It doesn't pain me too much. Just a twinge every so often."

_How did it happen, anyway?_ Silence hangs heavy between them while Sybil considers whether to ask. She knows the words won't come out nearly as casually as she'd try to make them sound.

She's almost worked up the nerve to say it when he speaks. "Let's go."

"Hmm?" She's got no idea what he's talking about. "Where?"

"To the mountains." He removes her hand from his chest and brings it to his lips. "You're here to see the country and you've barely seen any of it. We ought to bring a tent, make a proper holiday of it."

She laughs. "If we're going camping, I hope you know what you're about. I haven't even built a fire since Girl Guides."

"I'm no survivalist, but I can manage for a few days. Let's go on the Monday, then we won't have the weekend crowds to contend with." It's Wednesday, which gives them some time to prepare.

"Sounds like a plan." Sybil smiles in the dark. He's right about what she's seen of the area; for all his promises of giving her the grand tour of Darling Downs, they've hardly ventured from the house together other than trips to the shops for supplies.

But tourism was never the principal aim of her trip to Australia. And in her heart she knows that whatever she came here for, it is not why she stays.

-ooo-

On Saturday Tom goes into a dust-laden corner of the garage's back room and drags out a musty green canvas tent and a stack of aluminum poles tied together with rotting twine. "This was here when I moved in," he says. "I've not tried to set it up before. Maybe we should do a trial run in the garden, make sure everything's here we need."

A sweaty and profanity-laced hour later they've got a precarious, mildew-smelling roof over their heads. "Just don't bump against the walls," warns Tom, sitting in the middle of the tent floor with his arms held out as if to keep the thing from collapsing. Sybil stands next to him, the top of her head brushing the apex. It's not a large tent, but two people and their gear should fit rather comfortably.

"It'll be fine for two nights." She smiles down at him. That's their plan: to set off early Monday and be back by Wednesday evening. Tom was all for staying in the park the entire week; Sybil told him two nights was her limit for sleeping on the ground. In reality she doesn't mind it, but her sense that he can ill afford to lose five days' work is tingling.

_Not that it's any of my business. _She's paid for things whenever feasible. The first time they went to the supermarket together was a bit awkward: Sybil practically had to leap for the till before he could, rejecting the cash he offered afterward with a breezy _Don't be ridiculous! _She has been careful not to pry, and that's been much easier where his finances are concerned than with other aspects of his life that he chooses to keep private.

He reaches up to rub the back of her thigh. It's still warm enough outside that she's wearing shorts, and her stomach does a little flip at the feeling of his hand on her bare skin. "And if it's not," he says, "we'll sleep under the stars."

"Or in the car," she returns dryly.

"Where's the romance in that?" he pouts, tugging at her hand. She sits down next to him.

"Romance is all very well, but I don't fancy being dinner for some animal I've only ever seen in the travel guides." She gives him a kiss, which turns into another, and another.

Before long she's almost in his lap and he's grinning. "Are we christening the tent, then?"

"I don't mind."

He's got her on her back (_We really _will _need to make sure not to pitch the tent on top of any tree roots next time,_ she resolves) but they're still fully clothed when he murmurs, "I haven't told you, but I'm glad your car broke down."

Sybil smiles. "Spoken like a true mechanic."

"But no, really. Before you came I'd been…" he trails off, and she waits for him to finish his thought. He doesn't, instead bending his head to taste her skin.

She shivers. "It's been rather a whirlwind, hasn't it?"

"I've enjoyed it." His lips press against her throat, his arms tighten around her. "I'll miss this, when you go."

_But where am I going?_ is her initial, confused thought, a split second before she registers the sudden tension in his body. This is entirely different to their joke about leaving a note. He's done it: he's broken the tenuous fiction that things can go on as they have indefinitely. As soon as she realizes her breath catches and her hands freeze on his back. He waits.

Her brain takes forever to decide on a reply. It's not that she can't think of anything to say; it's that she can't decide which of the many possible responses to choose. She doesn't know what he wants: for this to end when its time is up? For them to try and make a go of it? More unsettlingly, she doesn't know what _she_ wants.

In that moment it crystallizes in her head: she _does _know what she wants. She wants him.

Her mouth curves in a lazy smile that belies her accelerating heartbeat. "Maybe I'll pack you in my suitcase and carry you back to England," she says lightly, "and then you can have a turn at being my guest for a while."

She doesn't know what she expected. Certainly not for his eyes to skate off to one side, for him to push up off her, his expression devoid of humor, and turn away in silence.

_Oh._ She's shocked at the almost physical stab that goes through her. _So it's all just a laugh to him then. _She knows even as the thought materializes in her mind that it can't be true, but tears spring to her eyes anyway. She wills them down, biting the insides of her cheeks, and sits up and turns away so he won't see the expression on her face if he looks at her. _Don't you fucking cry,_ she tells herself furiously. She's got little enough right to feel this way when she's the one who'll be leaving.

His hand rests tentatively on her back. She resists the urge to shake it off. "Sybil…" She feels his eyes on her but can't turn toward them, the tears are still in hers and she won't let him see. "I'd like that." His voice is raw, like he badly needs a drink of water. He clears his throat, a painful sound. "I can't, though." Now there's a pleading note that says _Please understand_ or _Please don't ask me why_ or something else that she cannot guess at. Slowly she turns her head to look at him, and something in his eyes breaks a little; she can see that he sees what she's thinking. "I wish—" his brow furrows; he draws his lips into his mouth. Then his gaze flicks back up to hers. "I mean it, you know. As long as you like. Stay as long as you like." Her hands are held in his without her knowing how they've got there; his rough fingertips rub gently against her palms. He looks like he wants to say more, but he doesn't. He gets up and walks out of the tent, leaving her alone, bathed in green-tinted light.


	5. Chapter 5: We Should Be in the Open

_AN: Thank you so very much for your reviews and your patience with my slow updating schedule. Life never seems to give me as much time as I'd like to write. Loving your comments and thoughts about Tom's backstory and what happens next!_

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Bunya Mountains, QLD, Australia: Monday

Sybil drives, since it's her car and the sat-nav knows where they're going more than Tom does. It's still

early morning and the swish of tires on the road lulls them nearly to sleep despite the cups of industrial-strength iced coffee Sybil poured them before they left (cold-brewing being one of the few culinary tricks she brought with her from England). Their silence is a comfortable one, even after what happened on Saturday; they'd fallen back into their usual rhythm by that night. Yet the exchange in the tent did not fail to sow disquiet, and Sybil turns it over in her mind while Tom dozes in the passenger seat.

When he said _I can't_ about going to England he sounded so final, as if he were asserting a law of nature: _I can't fly_. It's the first time he's acknowledged that he's not where he is by choice. _But why can't you?_ She would have asked if she hadn't been so choked up. She doubts he would have given a reply that told her anything, but now she is determined to probe for answers. Before, she was content—mostly—to let sleeping pasts lie. But if Tom's history is inclined to reach forward into the future, she'd at least like to have an idea of what it's going to grasp.

Knowing that is one thing; getting anything out of Tom will be another. Sybil's got no idea how she'll go about it. _Deal with it later,_ she tells herself for the tenth time, hoping the right moment will strike at some stage. Meanwhile, they've the panorama of the mountains in the windscreen and three days of being together in a new place, a beautiful place, and she is going to enjoy it.

The gently rolling farmlands of the downs have gradually risen into higher relief, and the mountains which fifty kilometers ago were a dreaming watercolor on the horizon are now upon them. Sybil can hear and feel the whine of the four-wheel drive kicking in as they wind up spiraling curves and around hairpin turns, the bluffs falling away into green-shadowed ravines to one side. Sybil concentrates on driving, relieved to have something else to take up her attention.

One of her transitory friends in Byron Bay scrawled directions for the final approach to the park on the back of a bar coaster, warning her that trusting the sat-nav at that stage could lead to disaster. She manages to find the park entrance without too much difficulty, pays for two nights' camping, and follows winding dirt roads to a campground which is surprisingly pedestrian, given the beauty of their surroundings. They pitch their tent in a mowed field that looks like the sort of place where kids would play impromptu games of football at home. The only difference is that it's dotted with odd-looking trees, growing stalks that resemble cattails out of their spiky tops.

They walk back to the RAV4 for their supplies and Tom motions toward the tree they've set up underneath. "They used to call those blackboys," he tells her. "Back in colonial days. Thought they looked like the Aborigines."

"Lovely." Sybil peers at another tree a little way off. If you squint, it could be a spiky-haired man carrying a spear.

"Yeah, your people've always been real charmers." Tom grins at her as she opens the car's back door. "Overflowing with brotherly love for their fellow man." He likes to tease her about the sins of her ancestors. Mainly he focuses on their treatment of his, but as he often points out, there are plenty of other transgressions to choose from.

Sybil's not in the mood for it today. "Oi. I'm not taking the blame for Australia as well." She shoves a plastic bin of kitchen supplies into his hands. "Just for that, you can make us lunch."

Unfazed, he laughs as he hefts the bin. "Your servant, m'lady," he says, and Sybil gets a funny little tickle of conscience that feels like an itch on the roof of her mouth. She considers her failure to tell Tom what sort of family she comes from a small omission, but it's not the kind of thing you hold back once you've gotten to… wherever they are in their relationship.

She clears her throat. "Funny you should say that." Her voice comes out reasonably bright, if a bit thin.

He's ten paces away, but he stops and half-turns with a quizzical look. "What, are you a secret royal or something?"

She chuckles at how close he's come to the mark. "Actually…" she begins, and his mouth falls open.

"Get away with ya."

"No, no, I'm not a royal!" She waves her hands as if to dispel his misconception. "My dad's only an earl."

She looks down so she can't see his face; there are a few beats of silence, followed by a guffaw from Tom and the scrape of him setting the bin down on the path. "Only an earl?" he laughs. "You poor thing." He walks up to her, takes her by the shoulders, and kisses her forehead soundly. He stands back and shakes his head, still laughing. _"Only_ an earl."

"I'm not really anything," Sybil babbles earnestly. "I mean, officially I'm called Lady Sybil Crawley, but it's only a courtesy title… we aren't rich, either, and we haven't got any servants. Well, my parents had a cook. But it's not like on TV."

"So serious! You look like you're afraid I'm going to brandish a crucifix at you." Tom's eyes twinkle in amusement. "So you really do have the blood of the oppressors in your veins."

Sybil thumps him on the chest, but she's beginning to see the humor. "I only wanted to tell you before it came out some other way and you thought I was keeping it a deep, dark secret." She can't prevent her eyes from landing on him with extra weight. _Talking of secrets… _

But he doesn't notice, only laughs and goes into the back of the wagon, coming out with an armful of blankets which he shoves at her. "Well, m'lady, could you carry these to the tent? If it's not going to roughen your soft little hands too much." He gives her a cheeky grin. "If you're nice to me, you can lie on them once we get all set up and I'll fan you with a palm leaf."

She purses her lips and lowers her head, looking at him through her lashes. "If I'm going to lie down, I think I'd rather you do something else for me." With that she sweeps off toward the tent.

"As my lady wishes," he mocks, but his voice has gone down in pitch and taken on a note that's instantly recognizable to Sybil.

The sun climbs higher in the sky as they finish setting up. Most of the people they've seen were heading toward the big campground up front where caravans are allowed, and their campground is deserted. Sybil rather hopes they're still alone by nightfall. They've deferred any acrobatics: the inside of the tent swelters despite them pegging open the door flap and rolling up the single window, making them crave the cool forest shade. They eat a quick lunch and tidy up, fill their bottles with boiled water, and set off up the nearest walking track. With his Akubra hat securely on his head and a bandanna tied round his neck, Tom quite looks the part of the bushman; all he needs to complete the picture is a machete for hacking through the underbrush. Small chance of that: they stay firmly on the trail and he scouts the route ahead with comic diligence, pushing back the overhanging leaves of a stinging nettle tree for Sybil in a motion absurdly reminiscent of opening a door for her. "Thanks, Dad," Sybil scoffs after the third time he warns her to watch for ticks.

"You laugh," he retorts, "but those little buggers carry some nasty diseases here. It's not like in your tame Yorkshire farmlands."

"Aren't you the expert."

"Ignorance can be dangerous." There's a grimness in Tom's tone that makes Sybil wonder if all he's talking about is the local fauna.

The forest is alive with noises: the keening and buzzing of insects, the dry crack of a branch breaking. Birds chatter in the trees, their cries as fantastic as their brightly colored feathers, and Sybil almost walks off the track trying to catch glimpses of them between the leaves. It's cool and dim under the verdant screen of the canopy. She and Tom soon fall silent: the indirect light and ambient sounds create a sense of awe, and neither wishes to break the spell. They stop at the first lookout, trees undulating in a bluish haze off toward the western grasslands. Tom gazes over the hills and says quietly, "One thing you can say for Australia, it's beautiful," with a look in his eyes Sybil can't read. Maybe he's thinking of gentler, greener slopes.

She takes his hand, squeezes it gently. "It is."

He turns his head and looks at her, drinking in her face as eagerly as he did the view, and leans over to kiss her. This turns into a couple of minutes wrapped together, which ends when they stumble toward the drop-off. "Maybe we should find a safer place to snog," laughs Sybil.

His eyes find hers and she can see that fire burning low in them that she's come to know so well; she couldn't look away if she wanted to. "Do you know what I'm thinking?" he murmurs.

"I can guess." Sybil smiles and teases, "What about the ticks?"

He nuzzles her neck, tickling her so that she wriggles and shrieks a little laugh. "I'll look you over for them afterward if you'll do me."

"Oh, I'll _do_ you all right—" She jumps again as his fingers close tight on her arse, but makes sure she moves _away _from the drop. "Stop, you." She disentangles herself from his arms and moves toward the track. "You're not allowed to touch me again until we find a suitable location."

One side of his mouth curls up in that way that always undoes her. "Oh, I can't possibly agree to that."

They hear the waterfall well before they see it. The resulting pool is near enough to the trail that passing hikers _might _catch sight of anyone in it, but Sybil is just horny enough not to care. Tom turns around and catches her eye, obviously thinking the same thing she is. They've moved to the bank and Tom's unlacing his boots when something occurs to her: "Do you think there's anything we ought to be concerned about in here?"

Tom looks up. "What do you mean?"

"Barracuda? Crocodiles? I don't think I'd fancy having my leg taken off in the middle of..." Sybil waves a hand, smirking. "You know."

Tom scans the murky water doubtfully. "You're probably right. I don't think they get crocodiles round here, but there might be snakes or parasites." He looks over at her with a grudging smile. "Fair play, you're thinking like an Aussie already."

Sybil smiles brightly. "Right, nature's always trying to kill you."

"And I was thinking with my dick." He sighs and lies back on his elbows before re-lacing his boots and pushing himself up to stand. "Well, onward and upward."

They walk further up the track, their progress slower now that they're half-occupied in scouting out a place to "rest." Sybil becomes more and more irritated as Tom, Goldilocks-like, rejects each of her suggestions. This place is too exposed, that one has too much undergrowth, a third is right next to an ant hill which may or may not be dormant; finding a proper spot to shag is much more complicated in the wilderness than one would think.

Finally Sybil lets out a sigh of frustration, and not the sexual kind. It's on the tip of her tongue to say something biting like _For God's sake, why don't you just hoist me up against a tree?_ but she catches herself with a little laugh.

"What is it?" asks Tom absently, scanning the path ahead.

"Us." She chuckles. "It's just now occurred to me that we do have the option ofgoing more than eight hours without having sex."

"Ha! You're right." He turns and pulls her into his arms. "It'll be a challenge, but I accept." His hand travels down Sybil's shoulder blade and around her ribs, settling on the narrowest part of her waist. "Of course, there's nothing that says we can't take breaks along the way."

He's got the rucksack on, so Sybil's arms can't go all the way round him; instead she slides her hand up his chest and to his stubble-shadowed cheek, bringing his mouth down to hers. He hasn't let his beard grow this much since he shaved that first morning. As they lean into each other and their kisses grow more heated, it scrubs against her face. She gives a little involuntary twitch. "Sorry," he murmurs. "In all the rush I didn't have time to shave it."

"I don't mind it." She rather likes it, in fact. It's rough, but a pleasing kind of rough, and seeing him with it takes her back. It's funny that she's already reminiscing about the day they met.

Ten minutes later they still haven't moved on. Tom's hat has fallen off his head, dangling by its string around his neck. Sybil's got her back pressed against a tree trunk and she's starting to think about proposing in all seriousness what she was going to say in sarcasm before.

The sound of feet tramping along the track barely registers with them, but the birdlike chatter of children's voices makes them jump apart. Red-faced, Tom whirls toward the forest just as a family of sturdy blond hikers appears around a curve from the direction of the campsite.

Dad's leading. "'Allo," he says in heavily accented English, beaming. "Nice day, eh?"

"Lovely," Sybil murmurs. Tom's whipped off his rucksack and is bent over pretending to go through it.

"Did you see the parrots?" asks a girl of about ten, who's got a pair of binoculars in her hands. Her younger brother edges up and makes a halfhearted swipe for them, but she's tall and easily pulls them out of his reach. Sybil shakes her head, wondering if she's blushing as deeply as it feels like she is.

Mum, bringing up the rear, looks as though she's got the lovebirds' number. Her eyes flit between them and the corner of her mouth pulls upward. "OK, enough chitchat," she says in a pleasant tone that nevertheless leaves no room for argument. "Hanna, you wanted to see the top, let's go and see the top." She gives Tom and Sybil an amused quirk of her eyebrow as she passes.

Tom lets them get out of sight before he turns back toward the trail with a wry smile. "That would've been awkward if we'd been shagging in the plunge pool."

Sybil winces, laughing. "Yeah. It was bad enough as it was. You in that state is not a sight fit for the eyes of children."

Tom's ears go red. "Why d'you think I turned away? But you've got to take at least some of the blame for that." He moves up to her and dips his head, his face burrowing into the hollow under her jawline. "I said it would be a challenge to keep away from you."

"Which you've not even tried to meet! Even now, in the face of irrefutable evidence that we're to have absolutely no privacy." To take the sting out of it she lowers her head to kiss the side of his neck. His skin is moist and there's a tang of salt to it, on top of that essential scent that both soothes and inflames her, the smell that's just _him_. Her heartbeat kicks up a notch.

"And you…" he sucks in a breath as her tongue finds the pressure point under his ear. "...are not helping. _Gah_—" he gasps as her fingers trace the outline of his cock through his trousers. His body jerks, unsure whether to move toward her or away. In the end he decides on toward. "What are you up to, ye little—"

"_Ohh,_" sighs Sybil as his hand goes between her legs, unerringly finding her most sensitive place even through two layers of clothing. The sensation of her soaked knickers rubbing against her clit makes her suck in a breath. At first she keeps caressing him but soon her hand falls away, her breath coming in gasps and leaving in moans. That's when he steps back.

She opens her eyes, feeling as though someone's rudely shaken her awake. "Why'd you stop?"

"I thought you were worried about the lack of privacy." He's grinning, the bastard. "You want to do this right on the trail where anyone might walk by?"

He's got a point. She lets out an exaggerated sigh. "_Fine_. I suppose we'll just have to enjoy the beauty of nature." She looks down to rearrange her T-shirt where it's ridden up and sashays past him up the track, trying to ignore the insistent pulse of arousal that still squirms within her. "I'll go first," she tosses over her shoulder.

By the time they arrive back at the campsite a few more tents have sprung up, including a large one right next to theirs. Sybil gives it a glare. "Really? They've the entire campground, and they have to set up _here?_"

Tom is more philosophical. "Well, it is one of the best spots. Share and share alike, love. I know that doesn't come easily to your lot, but…" he gives her a broad grin, and she scoops up some fallen leaves and throws them at him.

They take showers in a rudimentary stall where Tom first has to build a smoldering fire under a boiler to heat the water. Their neighbors return soon after they finish. It turns out that they're the same family they encountered on the walking track. "'Allo!" sings out the father upon seeing Tom and Sybil sitting on a blanket in front of the entrance to their tent. "Fancy meeting you here, eh?" Mum just nods and smiles before heading for the shower block. The kids ignore them completely, kicking a football over to an open area.

Dad is a friendly sort, though, and he comes over for a chat. His name is Niklas Larsson and he and his family are from Göteborg, Sweden. They're on a four-week holiday, traveling around the southeast coast and hinterland before catching a plane north to spend a week exploring the Great Barrier Reef. "Marie and I backpacked through the Nullarbor when we were younger," Niklas says. "A lot younger. This is a little bit different!" He laughs, showing two rows of square white teeth.

By the time Niklas goes to his tent to change, he and Tom have become instant best mates, and Sybil has got over her annoyance at the family's proximity. Niklas insists they join him and his family for the evening meal, as well as drinks beforehand. Marie comes back from the showers. She's friendly as well, though more reserved than her husband. At length Niklas doles out alcohol (bottles of strong dark ale for the men, white wine for the women) and they migrate to the barbecue area to start dinner.

Sybil chops potatoes and watches Niklas and Tom. The display of male bonding puts a smile on her lips: she hasn't seen Tom interact with men before, and it's a whole new side of him, louder and more expansive. They start off by debating fire-starting techniques; once the sausages are safely on the barbecue, they move on to sport. By the time dinner's nearly ready, Niklas has begun imparting wisdom.

"Have all of your cheap traveling done before you have kids!" he laughs. "When we came before, we worked our way across the country. And now… I won't even tell you how much we're spending."

"Enough to have a good time," Marie interjects from the picnic table. She's on her third plastic cup of wine and has loosened up considerably. She turns to Sybil. "You two haven't been going out long, have you?"

"Not at all." Sybil smiles, at the phrase _going out_ as much as anything else. That's one thing she and Tom have _not _done much of. "Only a few weeks, actually."

Marie nods, with a smile of her own. "I see that. You have that glow about you." She sloshes the wine in her cup and sips at it. "It's very cute." She gets up and calls her daughter and son over for the meal.

The dusk deepens into night while they're eating. After dinner the kids wander off to the edge of the forest to frighten themselves investigating the bushland noises while the adults linger at the fire, drinking and talking in the flickering light. Bit by bit their voices increase in volume, until Marie gently reminds them all that their fellow campers might not appreciate hearing every sentence of their conversation.

Tom has hardly been neglecting Sybil—he hasn't passed within arm's length of her tonight without some small caress—but most of his attention has been focused on their new friends. As the night wears on, he seems to become fully aware of Sybil's presence once again. Finally he does an elaborate yawn-and-stretch routine that fools no one, least of all Sybil.

For her part, she's been having thoughts of the two of them alone in their tent for the last hour. "Well, I'm knackered!" She announces brightly. "I think it's bedtime for me."

Tom fairly leaps to his feet. "Me too!"

"Sleep well," says Niklas.

"Good night, _älsklingar_," singsongs his wife fondly. The last glimpse Sybil has of the two of them shows a knowing smile spreading across Marie's face.

-ooo-

In the morning Marie does not look so indulgent. Sybil meets her at the communal tap and gives her a brilliant smile, which she returns by asking, "Did you sleep well?" with spikes on her voice.

"Yes, thanks!"

"Did you sleep at all?" With that Marie wrenches the tap closed and sweeps off with her jug of water, leaving Sybil open-mouthed.

_Bugger._ And she thought they'd been _quiet_. "Sorry!" Sybil calls after her.

Back in the tent Tom is still naked, unabashedly splayed out on top of the blankets. He beckons her to lie down with him. "And close the flap, would you?" He stretches mightily and his mouth curves with a lazy smile that would normally have Sybil's knickers off almost by itself.

But she is acutely conscious of the Larssons' camp-breaking sounds a few yards away. "Get dressed," she hisses.

"What is it?"

"They heard us last night."

Infuriatingly, Tom starts to laugh. "So what? It's camping. You've got to make your own privacy, love."

"Marie seemed a bit pissed off." Sybil's face flames as one of her more specific memories surfaces. "Oh God, I hope their kids didn't hear."

Tom, still chuckling, sits up and digs through his bag for some clothes. "I guess we've not felt the need before to hold back our enthusiasm."

Him saying that drives home once again how isolated they are at Tom's place, and not just physically. They've been living a sort of alternate reality. Thinking of it does nothing to improve Sybil's mood. "Well, I don't see anything funny about us having been inconsiderate," she says in a clipped undertone. "And we can't even apologize, because it'll only make them more uncomfortable." He calls her name as she ducks out of the tent, but she ignores him.

Five minutes later he emerges fully dressed and looking only slightly chastened. Niklas saunters over to say good morning and all but gives Tom a high five, which embarrasses Sybil but makes her feel a little better; at least the entire family's not mad at them. Even so, as a peace offering she and Tom help the Larssons carry their gear over to their rented CR-V. By the time they're done Marie looks a bit friendlier. She even smiles and mentions that the children slept like the dead all night.

Before climbing into the car, Niklas pumps Tom's hand and gives Sybil a kiss on the cheek. "Look us up if you're ever in Sweden!" he says. They promise they will, and the Larssons drive off.

"See, they weren't too fussed." Tom gives Sybil a grin.

Sybil stiffens her shoulders, still abashed. "They were too nice to dwell on it."

"They were nice, weren't they?" Tom is buoyant: apparently being out in the world and spending time with new people has done him good. He waggles his eyebrows at her. "Shall we hit the sack for a bit before it gets too hot?"

Sybil swats him on the bicep. "You're incorrigible."

"No… just insatiable." He grins again and drags her toward the tent by her hands. "C'mon."

Sybil is half tempted, but her words from the day before come back to her: _We do have the option of going more than eight hours..._ "I thought we might climb Mount Kiangarow." She puts her hands on her hips when Tom sags in mock fatigue. "We can't leave without conquering the Bunya Mountains' highest peak, now can we?"

Tom narrows his eyes at her. "You do know that you don't have to tick off every box in the guidebook, yeah? It's OK if you just relax and have a good time." Sybil shrugs and looks down, and Tom gives an indulgent groan. "Ahh, fine. We'll climb your mountain." He spins around and walks toward the tent, this time with purpose: the supplies are in there.

In spite of his initial reluctance, Tom is enthusiastic once they get started. Again he leads, pointing out items of interest on the path ahead for Sybil. It's cooler than it was yesterday, but even in the crisp air the climb warms them. By the time they stop for water, the ends of Tom's hair are damp and when he takes off the rucksack the back of his T-shirt shows a dark triangle of perspiration between his shoulder blades. Sybil has wiped her own face more than once. She's vain enough to hope she looks glowy rather than sweaty.

"You're sure about this, then?" asks Tom, squinting up the track. It looks like they're about halfway to the top of the mountain.

"I'm fine. We don't want to miss the view." Sybil drinks from her bottle and makes eye contact with him, arching her eyebrow. "Unless you're tired?"

Tom smirks. "I'm grand."

Toward the top it gets steeper and they have to scramble over rocks and tree roots on all fours, but the view is more than worth it: Sybil's mind goes still and reverent before the immensity of the land and sky falling away around them. She faces southeast, toward the Darling Downs, and imagines she can see the dark ribbon of road that brought them here. She can't, of course: it's all undulating green, misted over with the last white skeins of morning fog.

They take out the sandwiches they've packed and dine with the downs spread out below them. When they're done Tom stretches out with his hat over his eyes, while Sybil sits against a tree trunk with her knees drawn up. She raises her face to the brightening sun and closes her eyes. It's preternaturally quiet up here, the kind of quiet that fills her ears, but it doesn't feel oppressive. The clarity of the air seems made to sweep away doubts and fears, to enable positive thinking. She recalls her original intention to come up here on her own. It would have been nice in its way, being up here alone with the breeze and the sun and this solemn silence; it would have been another lovely afternoon in a string of them. But the simple addition of Tom makes it so much more meaningful.

She opens her eyes and looks at him dozing next to her, his hand resting lightly on her calf, and her heart swells with a feeling so powerful it fills her eyes with tears. To quell them she takes a breath sharp enough to make him pluck the hat from his face. He fixes her with an upside-down look, touched with concern. "You OK?"

She blinks a couple of times, rapidly. "Fine. Something got in my eye. It's out now."

"Mm. Grand." The hat goes back over his eyes, the hand back on her calf. He strokes her skin lazily. "You know, this is about as close to perfect as you could ask for."

"It is, isn't it?"

"You can tell this is a special place."

"Yeah. Apparently it always has been." Sybil has read in the park brochure that the Bunya Mountains were once a sacred meeting place of the Aboriginal people, but skimming a few paragraphs about it and being in the middle of it, _feeling _it, are two very different things.

"And being up here… with you…" Tom's hand stops moving. He takes the hat off his face again and sits up, turning round and looking at her with those arresting eyes, full to overflowing. His thumb scuffs across her cheek, leaving a trail of warmth. "Sybil, I'm so glad I met you." He infuses every word with meaning.

Sybil brings her hand up to caress his, still on her cheek. She holds his gaze, wondering if hers is as expressive. She hopes so; for some reason her tongue cleaves to the roof of her mouth and she can't speak. She's almost glad, because she is not at all certain she's ready to say the words that want to tumble out. Instead she just nods, leans forward, and kisses him.

The kiss is lingering, gentle, yet full of a subdued passion. It seems to last much longer than it does, or maybe it's just that Sybil's sense of time slows down. When they part she feels as languorous and satisfied as she does after a lengthy bout of lovemaking. Her stomach flutters and she gives a long sigh, leaning back against the tree. Tom smiles and lies down again.

A shadow falling on her face wakes her. Dark clouds have drawn over the sky, and a freshening wind whips through the leaves of the trees around them. Tom stirs as well, sitting up. "Ah, shite, looks like we're about to get a soaking." As if on cue a squall of tiny raindrops spatters against their faces. They scramble to their feet and make for the track down the mountain.

There's one waterproof in the rucksack; they huddle under it beneath a tree to wait out the rain, which is so furious that Sybil is sure it can't last long. The waterproof doesn't do its job very well, and Sybil's hair soon lies across her cheeks in wet ropes. But the storm soon passes, the rain stopping as abruptly as it came on. The resurgent sun raises a sultry mist from the soaked ground. They continue downhill, Tom joking that at least they won't need showers again; he doesn't much fancy a cold one, and that donkey boiler was a pure pain in the arse to get going yesterday. He'd rather go without until they get home.

"I see someone doesn't want a blow job tonight," Sybil says primly, though not before glancing around to make sure no other hikers are ready to materialize.

"Oh, la di da," he teases. "Such fussiness. Does it run in the blood, do you think?"

"Shut it," she yells good-naturedly. "I doubt we'll be in the mood anyway; the tent's going to stink even worse of mildew after that rain."

"All the more reason to tire ourselves out so we can stand to sleep there."

Down and down they tramp, meeting no one along the way. The ground is wet and treacherous, so Sybil doesn't look around, fixing her eyes on the path or on the back of Tom's head. Her thoughts travel back to the idyllic hour they spent at the top of the mountain: she wishes they could have just stayed there, like that, forever.

A question floats up in her mind, the same one that has risen so many times since Saturday. She tries to submerge it, but it will not be sunk. Suddenly she can't stand these thoughts blindsiding her any longer; it's been two days and already keeping silent feels like a long-standing habit. She takes a deep breath and a last look around at the green blur of the forest, and lets it come out.

"Tom?"

"Yeah."

She swallows. "Why can't you come to England?"

He stops walking so suddenly that she almost runs into him. His light tone when he answers belies the tension in his shoulders, but she can hear the strain running through his voice like a thread. "Because it's too near to Ireland."

He starts down the track again without another word. _Surely he doesn't think I'm going to leave it at that._

Obviously that's just what he's hoping she'll do. He speeds up until he's put several meters between them, crashing along the track with single-minded determination. But he has underestimated hers. By the time he has to slow down to negotiate a steep, rocky bit of trail, she's right behind him again.

"What's in Ireland that you can't be near?" she presses. This time he doesn't even stop, but she can tell he's heard her. "Tom, I know you've said you don't talk about it, but it seems like—"

He whips around, eyes blazing. "Can ye not just leave it?" It comes out as almost a snarl. She recoils and falls backward, her tailbone cracking hard enough against the ground to make her eyes water. Tom's eyes widen in panic. "Fuck! Are you all right? Ah, shite, Sybil, I didn't mean to..."

Sybil scowls at his outstretched hand, getting up without help and brushing pointlessly at the mud on the back of her trousers while he looks contrite. She jerks her head at the trail beyond him, staring him down until he stands aside to let her pass. On one hand she knows the wrath roiling in her stomach is irrational: he didn't mean to startle her, and that's not even what she's upset about. _Why can't he just be bloody reasonable?_ What could be so bad that he can't tell her about it? She stomps away without a backward glance.

He follows her. "Sybil… Sybil." She pays no attention, concentrating on placing her feet. "Do you even know where you're going?"

"Do you?" She whirls on him fiercely. "I'm not bloody _helpless_, Tom, I can find my way without your magical male sense of direction." He bites off a smirk, which infuriates her still more. "I'm going back to the campsite. Eventually," she snaps, turning away again. "And if you know what's good for you, you'll leave me be!"

He calls her name again but she ignores him and he doesn't follow her. She walks on doggedly, seeing little of the forest around her, until she is alone in a stand of gigantic bunya pines. It's like something out of a fairy tale; she half expects to come upon a cottage made out of sweets. The place is steeped in a churchlike hush, broken only by the sporadic tattoo of leftover raindrops falling from the upper branches. Under her feet is a carpet of pine needles that muffle her steps to a low rustle. Muted greenish light filters through the canopy. She stops, takes a breath, and lets it out, feeling some of her tension go out with it. Against the gargantuan scale of the forest Sybil feels utterly insignificant. At the feet of these ancient, gnarled sentinels, she is a mayfly.

She stays there for a long while, letting herself settle down completely before she turns her steps back toward the campsite. Any anger she still felt has dissipated by the time she sees the sagging olive-colored roof of their tent through the foliage. Tom isn't there, and concern flares in Sybil's stomach even though she knows there's no reason he should be: after all, she did tell him to leave her alone. He's probably tramping through the woods trying to calm himself, just like her. She perches on the picnic table with a book, but she can't concentrate and her body won't stay still. She chews her thumbnail half off before springing from her seat, going to the car, and getting out the food to start dinner. It's only midafternoon, but she needs a task to occupy her.

She soon has rice boiling away on the camp stove and fish and spices wrapped in their foil packets, and she's trying to decide whether she should go ahead and try to start a fire in the grill when Tom trudges up, all mud and sweat, looking generally miserable. He barely grunts at her before going into the tent to get fresh clothes; hardly spares her a glance when he stalks off to the shower. Her unease comes rushing back.

He returns cleaner but no more cheerful. He runs his eyes over the half-prepared dinner spread over the table, mutters, "I'm sorry… I'm not very hungry," and goes into the tent and zips the flap closed behind him.

Sybil stands clutching the handle of the wooden spoon she was using to stir, the spoon still in the pot but moving more and more slowly in the congealing rice. Finally she lets it go entirely. She wants to feel indignant. He should be asking her forgiveness, not sulking. But she can't stop thinking about the way he looked just before he went into the tent: haunted. Hunted.

She turns off the stove and walks toward the tent, leaving the food on the table for the birds and the wallabies. Tom's lying on the blankets on his back, hands behind his head, eyes wide and unseeing. When she zips herself in he turns toward the tent wall. She lies down next to him and puts her arm over him: he might as well be made of wood.

They lie there like that for several minutes. Sybil's about to ask him whether he's angry with her, just to say something, when he speaks.

"Are you going to leave?"

It doesn't sound like a challenge. He sounds as though he's terrified of her answer but he can't stop himself asking the question, like a man with a terminal illness asking the doctor how long he's got left.

She closes her eyes and pulls in a breath. "Tom, you know I have to eventually." He's silent, stiff in her half-embrace. "I don't want to."

He turns over so fast it startles her. His palm brushes her cheek. His eyes, dim with misery, fill the world. "I don't want you to either," he says, the words tumbling out hastily, and his mouth is on hers.

They kiss until Sybil starts to feel like she's drowning. "What shall we do, then?" she asks, pulling away. His gaze falls down between them: _I don't know_ it says, and the irritation from earlier returns. Sybil pushes herself up to a sitting position, looking down at him. "Look, you might be perfectly happy pretending things can go on like this forever, but—"

"I'm not." He looks away again. "Not any longer."

Her head aches. She draws her thumb and fingers together across her forehead to massage the center of it. "Everything's a secret with you," she says dully. "And nothing makes any sense. You've come to Australia and buried yourself alone in the middle of nowhere. You can't go home but you won't tell me why. You've got that scar on your chest and you've never said anything about how it got there." Her hand swoops off into the air; she can hear her voice rising, see Tom shrinking back into the pillow, but she can't stop herself. "I'm tired of it, Tom! I'm tired of secrets. How am I meant to plan for the rest of my life when I don't have the full story? I've hardly got any of it!"

_The rest of my life._ She didn't mean for it to come out like that, but she does not miss the way his face stills at the words. She presses her lips together in shock at how easily they came out; how completely she meant them.

His eyes plead with her. "Can't you let the past stay past?"

Sybil looks at him for a long moment and shakes her head. "It won't, Tom." She sighs. "No matter how much you want it to, it won't. I know I'm hardly one to talk; I've been doing nothing so much as running away myself." She gives him a sad little smile. "It did make me feel better to tell you about it, though. Why are you afraid to tell me?"

He turns his head away. "I don't know. Trying to pretend it doesn't matter, I guess." He sighs, the sigh of someone who's carried a heavy burden for so long that it's become part of him. "But you're right. It does matter."

He gets slowly to his feet. "Let's go outside. For this, we should be in the open."


	6. Chapter 6: What It was Like

_AN: Thank you, thank you for your wonderful reviews! I love hearing from you and I'm sorry I haven't been able to reply to all of them—I think "super fkn busy" is my new normal for a while. _

_So: Tom's tragic backstory. There are some (not very graphic) descriptions of violence and its results. _

_Thanks to cassiemortmain for her continued excellent beta reading and advice._

* * *

_I've been a bleeding fool. _

That's the thought that runs through his head again and again as he blunders around the forest, mud squelching over his boot tops. Eventually, he circles back to the campsite. The sight of Sybil at the portable cooker, the twist of her shoulders as she half turns toward him, knots his stomach with remorse. For losing his temper with her: sure. But it's more than that. He's fucked her, eaten the food she's cooked for him, spent every spare minute with her for the greater part of a month. For most of that time he's been fantasizing about a future with her, but he hasn't had the courtesy to clue her in. She's told him the worst thing that ever happened to her, but he hasn't given her that same trust.

He can't face her yet. A shower (cold; the last thing he feels like right now is mucking about with fire) only provides further chance to ruminate on the staggering amount of magical thinking he's indulged in over the past few weeks, and if he's honest for much longer than that. This country's what does it. The place is so wild—so _foreign—_that you can never quite forget you're on the other side of the world from home. The sheer space of it, the sweep of worn out-looking sky overhead, breaks open your mind and drives you a bit mad. The land is so vast that it seems as though you could find a place to bury your secrets where no one, least of all you, could ever find them again.

It's easy to see why Australia was once the dumping ground for Britain's petty criminals and scandal-ridden second sons. And it's easy to see why people came here full of plans to strike it rich and start new lives. But sooner or later reality must set in. For the luckless thieves and forgers, whenever it finally sank in that Britain had banished them to end their days thousands of miles from anything familiar; for the remittance men, when the cheques from home stopped coming, and the ill-prepared, gold-hungry settlers, when the last mouthful of food was gone. And for Tom.

It's been nice, these last few weeks. Sybil was right: he's been perfectly happy pretending things can go on like this forever. He'd got remarkably good at it. But that's all over now. He feels a bit like the time—he was fourteen, so Dec would've been eight—he caught his younger brother in the alley with one of the stray cats that used to proliferate in their neighborhood like mushrooms after a rain in the woods. Declan had had the poor bugger for a while, it looked like: one of its ears was torn and bleeding, and it was favoring its front paw. Now Tom has that same sense of being forced to make a terrible choice he's not prepared for: to face something head-on or turn away, with either option sure to hurt someone.

_Whatever she's thinking, it's probably worse than the truth. _He holds onto that thought as he slinks back to the tent and lies down. Telling himself that's one thing: believing it's quite another. For two years he's tried to convince himself he's free of the past, when in fact he's just been on a very long chain.

If he keeps silent, he'll lose Sybil for sure. If he spills the whole of the sad tale, he might still lose her… and she'll know.

_Know what? That you're not perfect? I've got news for you, mate: she knows it already._

The bravado is unconvincing even inside his head. There've only been a handful of occasions when he couldn't bully himself out of being afraid, and this is one of them. He can't reason himself out of it either. Tom knows intellectually that Sybil is not the sort of person who'd judge someone for being weak. But he can't bear the possibility, however remote, that she might judge him. They've become so close in such a short time, but how deep does it go? She doesn't truly know him. He's got no real reason to believe she'll stay after she finds out he's not the man she seems to think he is.

He lies flat on his back with the rhythmic whoosh of blood in his ears spurring me into a quiet kind of panic. _Gone, gone,_ it seems to whisper. That's what she'll be, along with what he's come with frightening ease to think of as his second chance at happiness. Maybe he's been deluding himself, and she doesn't see their relationship as anything more than a laugh. Maybe she's just waiting for an excuse to leave. This would be a fine one, for any number of reasons.

Then she comes into the tent and lies down next to him and speaks the words _the rest of my life,_ and hope stirs again in his heart.

-o-

They walk a little way into the woods, far enough that the foliage screens them from the campground, but still in earshot of the shouts of children playing between the tents. They sit side by side on the trunk of a fallen tree, and he starts from the beginning.

He want her to understand what it was like for him and his brothers, growing up. In Ireland when they were kids, his immediate environment was filled with people the world had judged superfluous, at least in the economic sense. When you got out of school, if you were lucky you knew someone who could get you in at Guinness or one of the factories, or else you emigrated. But luck, much like gainful employment, was thin on the ground. A substantial minority of the adult male population turned up at the pub every day like it was their job, and there was no one who could tell you for sure that you'd do any different.

In this climate Tom's da was a stand-up guy. Tom has held onto little more of his father than the piercing sense of nostalgia that hits at the sound of a laugh drifting from a pub entrance, a whiff of a certain brand of cigarette. He has one clear recollection, and he's unsure whether it's even real or he just dreamed it. In this maybe-memory, a man sings in a window-rattling voice as Tom looks up at him for what seems like miles. Da's laughing his booming laugh in between verses, urging his son to join in, and Tom's heart swells up inside him with an adoration so strong it's almost painful. Whatever his da's faults—and he did have them—they'd all have been better off had he lived. That can't be said for every man.

But he died, under circumstances made somewhat mysterious by Kieran's and Tom's youth at the time, their mother's determination to keep her grief private, and all of their unwillingness to open old wounds. In that cheek-by-jowl neighborhood where everyone knew everyone's else's business, reserve—even about death—was hardly the norm. But when Ma fell pregnant a few years after her husband's death, she learned swiftly and painfully that community is a double-edged sword.

It wasn't as if she was ostracized, but the shift was obvious enough for Tom to pick up on even at the age of five. He remembers mutterings and cluckings in the street and between the wash lines: _The father was gone as soon as she told him. Can you imagine? _Even then, he could hear the glee underneath the false empathy. _You play with fire, you get burnt, sure. _A few friends disappeared from his life quite suddenly; it was only later he realized that their mammies had probably told them they weren't allowed to play with him any longer. Neighbors who'd always been happy to keep an eye on him and Kieran when Ma picked up an extra shift at the factory were suddenly too busy. The open-handedness of people who'd known each other for years, who were all in this together, became the grudging charity of strangers.

Declan was difficult right from the beginning. He was a sickly baby, never slept well, didn't like to be held or rocked, would just stare at you like you were mad if you tried tickling him or chucking him under the chin. At the same time, he was needy. Well into toddlerhood, if Ma left him in his cot alone he'd scream until she came back.

Tom hated him. He knew it was wrong, but he did.

Maybe hate was too strong a word. But Tom resented the way Declan's entrance into their lives upended the order of things, made their mother too tired to talk and laugh and read stories like she'd always done before. In time, the grudge lost its sharp point, but it never went away entirely. Declan the difficult baby grew into Dec the scowling boy who hated nothing more than being bossed, and Tom, as the next eldest brother, was forever in the position of having to boss him. By the time Dec was into his teens, they could hardly go a day without a shouting match or worse.

Yet they were still brothers. Maybe it was only out of guilt at his failure to develop the appropriate feelings of fraternal love, but Tom genuinely did try to show Dec the right way to go. Not that it did much good. Birth was seen as destiny where they lived, and the kid had come out of the gate with no father and his mother a slag who'd got herself in difficulty. Small wonder that hardly anyone outside their family expected anything but that he'd go to the bad. They were right. Before he was in his teens he was hanging out with the kids who passed their time breaking into cars parked in the street. But he was successful, in his own way: soon he was the leader of their little gang. He had charisma, Declan.

Before long the guards were coming round telling their mother _your son broke into such-and-such shop, if he gives back what he stole we won't throw the book at him._ In a very polite way and over a cup of tea, Ma would basically tell them to fuck themselves. That was how you handled that sort of situation. But Tom could tell it killed her. She'd always had high hopes, despite their family's humble circumstances. She was certain that Kieran would start his business, that Tom would go to uni and do great things. She was closemouthed about any predictions she made of Declan's future—her belief in her sons was never blind faith, so she can't have had too many illusions about his character—but she did love him.

And he disappointed her. Every night in the flat was torture. If Dec was home it'd be Ma yelling plaintively and him sulking and slamming out of the place, and then she'd worry so loud Tom could practically hear it through the wall of her room. But he's ashamed to say that by then he'd more or less checked out. His dreams were pulling at him pretty hard. Kieran had already gone to England, and Tom had made up his mind to move into his own place as soon as he could afford it, get an education, become a lawyer or a novelist or some shite, and put the whole mess behind him. He'd like to say he planned to buy Ma a house, spirit her and Declan off to the suburbs. Maybe he would have done. But he doesn't remember ever thinking beyond getting himself out of there, and he saw university as his one chance. His mother, God love her, never said a word about him staying even though they were letting people go at the factory and things were so difficult with Declan. The last thing she wanted was to hold any of her boys back.

Sometimes, Tom thinks he told himself there was nothing to be done just so he wouldn't have to do anything.

-o-

Sybil is quiet while he tells her all of this. The most she does is nod and make sympathetic noises, her face going still at certain bits in a manner Tom has come to recognize as her way of hiding her feelings. Her head jerks up, though, when he says the last part. "You wanted to live your own life," she says. "There's nothing wrong with that." Her eyes flash, and Tom almost smiles at how strongly she defends his younger self. When she was in school she probably went door to door collecting tinned food in aid of kids like him. Sybil's far from spoilt, but you can tell at a glance how good she's had it. That iron self-assurance, the inborn conviction that she deserves to take up the space she occupies—that's something that only comes from a childhood of being cosseted, treasured, _important_. No one will ever be able to tell her she's nothing. It's one of the things that draws him to her, maybe because he saw so little of it where he was raised. Arrogance, sure. But the fellas who threw their weight around back home did so more out of bravado than true self-worth: they always had something to prove.

It was only one of the things he had hoped to escape, years ago. Thinking of how close he was, he can almost taste that same acrid tang of disappointment on the back of his tongue. He swallows hard. "Anyway, I only had a couple of terms at uni…"

"You never said you went to university!"

The excitement in her voice makes Tom give her the old crooked eyebrows, a similar face to the one he made when she asked if they shouldn't just buy a new tent for a three-day trip. "Well, I didn't finish, did I?" That deflates her. "It didn't seem worth mentioning."

Once again, he's underestimated her sympathy for teen-aged Tom. "Of course it was."

He doesn't tell her that nine months at UCD gave him little more than a look into a world he quickly realized he'd never be part of. He looks down, picking at a black-rimmed cuticle. The grease will never come completely out of the microscopic cracks in his skin, no matter what he uses or how much he scrubs. He almost manages to sound matter-of-fact when he says, "But Ma lost her job and couldn't get another, so I dropped out and went to work."His hand creeps up, scratches at his two-day beard. It's weird, how quick you get used to being cleanshaven. Sybil's looking at him as though she feels sorry for him. _My one chance._ She reaches over and takes his free hand in hers. Her fingers are soft, but she keeps her nails cut short: better for working with her hands, she told him once.

He surprises her again when he tells her how he lived outside London, working in the same garage as Kieran and sleeping on his and his flatmates' sofa. That was an odd year. He liked England well enough but somehow he knew from the beginning that he wasn't there forever, so he never bothered to put down roots. He watches Sybil's face and wonders what she was doing whilst he lived out of a suitcase and sent home two-thirds of his pay. It occurs to him that she's Declan's age. He pictures her having a sleepover in a canopied bed choked with ruffles, whispering about boys with her best mate, while across the water his brother slinks about stealing car stereos. Most likely her reality wasn't as idyllic as he imagines it: upper-class families have their problems like everyone else. And naïve as Sybil might have been back then, she only looks a little shocked when Tom tells her what happened to call him back home.

The news of Declan's arrest came in the form of a predawn telephone call from Tom's Aunt Kay, who'd married, got herself a nice semi-d in the suburbs, and seemed to have spent the last decade and a half trying to forget she had a sister. Details were sketchy over the phone, but he gathered that Dec had been picked up by the Garda, Ma was a mess, and she needed one of her good sons to console her over having lost her grip on the bad. Kieran had the flat, the longer-term job, his savings, and his eminently practical aspirations of opening his own business one day; Tom had a rucksack full of frayed jeans and greyish T-shirts, and a head full of nebulous and so far thwarted dreams. Tom went.

Because of his youth and the fact that it was a nonviolent offense, Declan got off with a few months in detention school, though from the way their mother took it you'd have thought she'd expected him to become Taoiseach. Tom, for his part, harbored a grudging pride that Dec had steadfastly refused to turn in his mates or whoever had been fencing his gear, even though it might have saved him a trip to Oberstown. That didn't mean Tom was going to allow things to go on as they had been, though. If he hadn't been a father figure before, he would be now. Obviously Dec was in need of one. As soon as he arrived home Tom set firm ground rules: no drinking. Regular attendance at school. No going out after curfew, and he'd report what he was doing and who with at all times. He broke them all almost immediately, and with a sneering brazenness that was even more infuriating than the fact that he'd done it. Tom has to admit he let Declan press his buttons. He could do it like no one else, and Jesus bleeding Christ did he love the power that gave him. And Tom was still only twenty-one, with a short fuse and a chip on his shoulder from (as he saw it) having had his future all but stolen from him. The flat was a tense place for the next three years, and it wasn't only Declan's fault.

It all came to a head soon after he turned eighteen, when he pulled a five-day disappearing act and Tom watched Ma age ten years in less than a week. As soon as Declan showed his face again, Tom told him to pack his things and get out of the flat. He left with surprisingly little protest; he must have been half out the door already, to have gone so quietly. _Good riddance,_ Tom thought, then and now.

To Tom's utter lack of surprise, they didn't hear much from Dec for a while after that. Tom and his mother hardly talked about him. Some days it was almost as if he'd never existed. The few times they got together over the next four years, it was apparent that his star was rising in the crew he'd fallen in with. A couple of Christmases after he'd moved out, the first one where he deigned to show up for Ma's dinner, he pulled up to the kerb in an M6. In that street, such a splashy car elicited both admiring looks and respectfully averted faces. Declan's gains might have been ill-gotten, but he'd got them, and he had more clout than most people. Certainly more than Tom.

And he had a reputation. Tom at least partly believed the stories he heard. Declan was no goon; he had a good brain on him, and he'd used it to his advantage. But to rise as quickly as he had, he must be on better than nodding terms with violence. He didn't wear his temper on his sleeve, but the storm is always more dangerous when you can't see it coming. But between Tom's mother and work and his own life—it almost seems odd now, to think that he had a social life at one time—he had too much on his plate to dwell on his brother. At the same time, he'd got to a place where he could breathe. He had a few years of work experience under his belt, a bit of money saved. He was even thinking about starting a night course.

So he was wary when Declan began coming round more often, but he was so conciliatory that Tom couldn't find anything wrong with it. He never claimed outright that he'd abandoned his previous ways, and Tom figured that the Internet marketing firm Declan told them he'd started with a partner was either a front or funded with some seriously dirty capital. Ma was ecstatic, of course, and swallowed every acronym of his work-related twaddle—SEO, CTR, ROI, you never heard such bollix—when he came round for tea. Tom kept his doubts about the new leaf Dec had turned over to himself.

In the spring came Ma's birthday. It was her fiftieth, and Tom organized a quiet dinner out with her nearest and dearest. There were few enough of those. Kieran couldn't make it, as his wife was only a couple of weeks away from giving birth to their second daughter, and though the neighborhood had by now forgiven Tom's mother her transgressions, she'd become a little less trusting as a result of their long-ago cold shoulder. A few neighbors, a couple old friends from the factory, Aunt Kay and her family, and Declan completed the list of invitees.

Declan never showed. They were meant to meet up at eight; at nine Tom finally convinced his mother to let them order and then stepped outside with his mobile to give Declan a piece of his mind.

When Declan finally answered, he only said shortly that he was still at work.

"What the hell, Declan? It's Ma's birthday."

"I know that."

"Well, we're at dinner and she's waiting for you. Bring your arse over here."

"I can't," Declan said, sounding a million miles away. "It's mad here. Sorry."

"You can't leave for one hour? Bollocks. Get the fuck over here, Declan."

"Jaysus bloody Christ, Tom, just tell her I got held up. I'll make it up to her."

Declan spoke to his brother like he was giving one of his underlings an order, but it was the annoyance in his tone that really got under Tom's skin. He rang off with no further protest—no use ruining the evening completely—but seethed through dinner and dessert. Once they got home Ma said the same thing she always had: _Don't let him get to you, Declan is how he is._ Except now she was actually _proud _of him, and it made Tom want to puke, how thoroughly Dec had snowed her.

He'd had several pints at dinner and his inhibitions weren't at their highest. Once Ma had gone to bed, he decided to go round and offer some brotherly advice on the proper way to treat one's mother. He had a few ideas about how Declan could atone for his lapses: contributing to their mother's upkeep, for a start. He sure had money enough.

Declan had moved frequently in the last five years, and this last time he hadn't bothered to update Tom on his address. If he was as swamped as he claimed, though, he might still be at the office, a mere twenty minute walk away. Before Tom could think about it too much he was out the door and on his way. Declan's company had its headquarters in a former industrial sector of Dublin which in recent years had become something of a hipster business district, though the long economic slump had dampened its renaissance. The street was deserted: there were as many abandoned warehouses as there were tech startups and boutique consulting firms, and at this hour most of their employees had long since decamped to the bars in South Great George's Street. Tom had been to the office once, when he and his mother had been invited to come down and see how Declan had made good. The place was all blond wood and reclaimed factory light fixtures, staffed with girls in high-waisted skirts and blokes who looked as though they spent more time grooming their facial hair than doing actual work. This time, instead of trying the front door, Tom ducked into the alley to go round the back.

For a long time after that night, Tom was in the habit of going over its events in his mind. How would it have changed things if this detail or that had been different? What if, muzzy with alcohol, he hadn't been able to find the place? What if he'd simply knocked at the front entrance? What if Declan had locked the back door? But he hadn't, and it came open easily, a grey steel slab whose only features were a metal handle and unevenly applied alphabet stickers spelling out _iDEAS Media_: _Deliveries_. It went with the area's original spartan character, as did the narrow concrete-floored space inside. The only illumination came from the front offices, to which the door was half open, but Tom sensed even before he saw the shadows of men that he wasn't alone.

In the dimness the burst of light, eerily reminiscent of a cigarette lighter striking, was all the more visible. The report was oddly subdued: more like a dart pinging into a dartboard than a gun going off. Though the door was still open, there was no reverberation off the alley's opposite wall. Yet it seemed deafening. It took agonizing seconds before the swish-and-thump of a body slumping to the floor registered on Tom's brain, as well as the fact that the silhouette which had partially blocked the muzzle flash belonged to his younger brother.

* * *

_Sorry not sorry for the cliffhanger. Muahuahua. You can blame cassiemortmain for the suggestion of where to break this chapter (and thank her for the fact that this first part's up as soon as it is)! Next update should take less time._


	7. Chapter 7: We've a Bit of a Situation

_AN: All right, who loves ya? Told you I wouldn't leave it too long. :) But really, the response to this fic has been amazing and such a great motivator. I'm so glad you're enjoying reading it as much as I am writing it._

_I'm doing some traveling in the next few weeks, so I probably won't be able to update again before the middle of June. As usual, thanks to cassiemortmain for the beta._

_This picks up right where we left off._

* * *

It took a few seconds for what he'd just seen to come together in his mind. Even then, he felt almost dizzy with the effort of believing that what had happened was real; that what he was seeing now was real. Some part of him kept insisting that it couldn't be.

Declan stood facing away from the back entrance. A wedge of yellow light fell from the door to the front; it wasn't very bright, but in Tom's slow-motion vision it illuminated the scene as though it were on a stage. Without a doubt, that was his brother, standing over a very newly dead human being. He hadn't seen or heard Tom yet. He gave a dismissive grunt: _That's that, then_.

Tom's breath crouched in his throat for what felt like a century but was actually only a couple of seconds. He just had time to visualize his exit plan _OK back up quietly don't let the door slam then run like fucking hell_ before he sensed the change in Dec's posture that meant he was caught. Declan whirled, the gun rising like a snake ready to strike.

Tom made a split-second decision that probably saved his life. Instead of trying to bolt, he stepped _into _the room, toward the light, with his hands up. "Dec, it's me, it's Tom!" The door clapped shut behind him and he nearly pissed his kecks.

But his instinct had been right: this was not his moment to die.

Declan lowered the gun a bit, though he kept the barrel facing Tom's general direction. He was nothing if not controlled. There was only a hint of shock in his voice when he said, "Tom. What the fuck are you doing here?" He shuffled sideways to the wall, and the room filled with cold bright light from a fluorescent strip mounted on the ceiling.

They both blinked. Tom's eyes flicked past Declan, where dark tributaries runnelled into little pools via the wrinkles in a plastic sheet laid down on the floor. The guy had been kneeling. A hood, most of which was dark with wet, covered his head. Tom looked away.

"Tom?" Declan prompted, serving as a reminder to Tom that he still had a gun pointed at him. "You picked a shite time to pop in on me at work, mate."

Tom sputtered a reflexive laugh, almost a cackle. Declan scowled, and Tom bit the insides of his cheeks until the rogue hilarity was under control. He couldn't think of anything to say that would simmer Dec down. His brain wasn't working terribly well, or rather it was working _too _well, zooming around corners like the cars in a F1 race, but none of the lines of thought seemed appropriate to speak aloud. "Sorry," he said finally. "Sorry. I came down here to…" he laughed again in disbelief. It seemed so ridiculous now. "I was going to give out to you for missing Ma's birthday dinner."

Declan stared hard at him for a long moment, then began to laugh: at first a grudging, rusty sound, then louder until he was practically roaring. Tom's legs, which he hadn't realized until then were unsteady, spilled him onto a packing carton a short backward stumble away. Declan's gun hand jerked at the sudden movement—even in the haze of relief, Tom didn't miss that—but then he walked over and perched on the next carton, still chortling.

"My big fucking brother," he said. He reached over and clapped Tom on the shoulder, shaking his head.

Tom said nothing. There wasn't anything to say, really: _So how's business? You kill men often?_ Declan's laugh stopped like a tap turning off, his eyes narrowing. His grip tightened almost painfully on Tom's shoulder before he released it. Tom didn't dare glance down to see where the gun was. He didn't want to look at Declan, or the body of his associate. _Former associate._ He ended up putting his eyes into the corner of the room.

"So we've a bit of a situation here, brother," Declan said softly.

Tom swallowed and gave a short nod, still not looking at him. "I won't say anything to anyone." He meant it: whatever differences they'd had in the past, Dec was his brother. Judging by the corpse's style of dress, he'd been involved in the same sort of business as Declan, so Tom only felt a twinge of compunction at consigning him to an unmarked grave.

Declan was silent for a long while. When Tom finally looked up he found his brother's eyes on him, assessing. Dec had won the genetic lottery in their family as far as looks went: the girls compared him to a young George Clooney, or else the one—Henry somebody—who'd played Superman in the most recent film. But they mightn't have found him so charming just then. Tom had known Declan could be terrible, but he'd only really felt it once before that night. His cheeks were drawn in, his mouth a hard line. Tom had no doubt his life hung in the balance.

After a minute or two Declan's face became mobile again and he said, "I believe you."

People always talk about the massive rush of euphoria that follows the cheating of death. After tonight, Tom would know firsthand that it wasn't a tall tale. He couldn't stop the grin spreading across his face.

What Declan said next wiped it off. "I'll need you to help me with him." He spoke as casually as if asking for help moving house.

"What?"

He nodded toward the body. "We'll have to get rid of him." He rolled his eyes at Tom's expression. "Oh, come on, Tom. You saw me shoot him. I need some kind of assurance."

Tom's mouth fell open. "You think I'd give you up to the Garda? For that guy?" He flapped a hand at the body. "I'm your fecking _brother!_"

"You're an upstanding fecking _citizen_, is what you are." Declan shifted his weight backward on the crate and fished a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. He offered it to Tom, who took one even though he hadn't smoked since his voice was still breaking. The first drag was astringent, aromatic with butane from the lighter; the next tasted exactly like dried burning leaves, but it steadied the minute trembling in his hands. They sat in silence and smoked the fags down to the filters.

Tom extinguished his under his shoe, took a deep breath of smoke-filled air, and said, "OK." As if he had a choice. His heart had started to pound, from the unfamiliar burst of nicotine or nerves or both. "How do we do this?"

"We roll him up in the plastic, chuck him in one of these—" Declan thumped the crate under him—"and he goes into the back of the company van. After that we bleach the floor in here, find him a final resting place, toddle off home for a couple of nice big whiskeys before bed, and never speak of this again."

Tom swallowed with some difficulty—the cigarette had sucked every drop of moisture from his mouth—and stood up. "Let's get on with it, then."

He thought disjointedly as he walked toward the body that it was entirely possible that this could be the defining event in the relationship between him and Declan, the thing that would finally put them on the same side. Secrets, after all, have a way of bringing people together.

Or dividing them forever.

-o-

"Tom?" Sybil interrupts. "Are you all right?"

He turns his head to look at her, but doesn't stop moving: he's been pacing around in the dirt like a madman since he came to the bit where he threw Declan out of his mother's flat. "I'm coming to it." He kicks a stone a few meters into the forest. It skitters through the underbrush and thwacks against a tree trunk.

"You look a bit green." She reaches out. "Come here." She's right, he probably does look upset. His eye sockets feel dry and tight, and his hair must be standing on end from all the times he's run his hands through it. Sybil's not exactly the picture of serenity herself, brow knit and eyes dark. Either she's caught some of his turmoil or she's got an inkling of what he's about to tell her. It's strange to see her so ruffled. _Be careful what you wish for,_ he almost says, but instead shakes his head and begins to furrow a line with the heel of his boot. He watches it deepen in front of him, the rich dark earth piling up in hillocks on either side, and says, "He shot me. My brother."

The silence from her is more than an absence of sound or word: it's a void, the space left empty when someone's view of the world collapses in on itself. It's antimatter.

Tom knows exactly how she feels.

-o-

The packing of the body and the cleaning of the space went off just like Declan said. Of all the things that happened that night, that experience is the one that still gives Tom the heebie-jeebies when he thinks about it. He's not particularly squeamish, and there wasn't too much blood, but he'll never forget the limp dead weight of the corpse flopping over as he rolled it up. He was heartily glad that Declan had covered the bloke's face. Dec was completely matter-of-fact about the whole thing. _He's done this before,_ a cool voice said in Tom's head, and though he'd known it was true the moment he walked into the room it was still difficult to _believe_. His brother, the cold-blooded killer. It was chilling how well it fit.

Soon—though not nearly soon enough—the crate was in the back of the van. Declan drove for a long time, past the outer ring road, turning off the M3 at a point seemingly chosen at random. He was perfectly at ease, humming along with Led Zeppelin on the radio. Tom drummed his fingers on the armrest and prayed they wouldn't get pulled over.

They'd been crisscrossing the countryside for half an hour before Declan pulled off to the side of the road. Tom looked around, nonplussed. They were on a narrow dirt lane and there wasn't anyone about, but it still seemed like a pretty exposed place to hide a body. But he didn't say anything, and Declan offered no explanation. He got out of the van, and Tom followed.

It happened in the space of an eyeblink. He rounded the back of the van, and a bull charged through his right shoulder.

Confusion hit before anything else. It was like when you're in the middle of a tense passage in a book and you accidentally turn three pages instead of one: it takes a second for you to catch up to the fact that you're further ahead than you thought.

Almost instantly, the pain blasted that away, a white-hot flare radiating out from Tom's chest. It wiped all thought from his head. For a few seconds he couldn't even see. Afterward, he could never quite call up in his mind what it actually felt like, except for the metallic taste of blood welling up in his mouth from where he'd bitten his tongue when he hit the a time—a minute, a year—the pain grew less intense, if not exactly bearable. It occurred to Tom that maybe this meant he was dying. _Huh,_ he thought. _So this is how it happens. _That was just fine with him.

Declan, who'd been temporarily relegated to the far background, floated into Tom's field of vision. Tom groped in his mind to remember why he was there; then the recollection blew apart his false calm. The gun was still in Declan's left hand, and Tom had never been more sure of anything than he was of the fact that his brother was going to shoot him again. At the same time, it was intolerable that he should. Tom scooted away on his back, using his feet to push himself along in the dirt. The movement shot a fresh spike of agony through him and he yelled, his head thudding back onto the road. He was shaking uncontrollably. _Just fucking do it,_ he said, but the words were only in his mind. He squeezed his eyes shut, clenched his teeth, and waited for the low-pitched _thwup _that would end his life.

Instead he heard the creak and slam of the driver's door opening and closing, the roar of the engine coming to life. As Declan peeled off, the tires kicked a stinging rain of dirt and pebbles into Tom's face. He coughed, whimpering at the pain it brought. It was an overcast night, utterly black. He lay there hardly sure whether his eyes were closed or open, hearing but not really registering the noises of a country night, so different to the ones you get in the city.

He could feel the life ebbing out of him. Blood soaked the back of his T-shirt, making the fabric stiff and tacky as it dried. He'd stopped shaking a little while after Declan left, but soon he began to shiver with a terrible, bone-deep chill. His mobile was in his back pocket. It would probably be a good idea to call someone, but it seemed like far too much effort. Some part of his brain yammered _No! No, this is _not _how it happens! There's still time! Get your arse up, you useless cunt!_ But it felt like a barely remembered voice from the past.

Then the world exploded in light.

-o-

Sybil is silent for a long time.

"Golly," she says finally. "And I thought my sisters had a difficult relationship."

The attempt at levity falls flat, but Tom gives a weak chuckle anyway. "Wait 'til you hear what he said to me when he visited me in hospital."

Her head comes up; she's been studying her hands, which twist together in her lap. "Someone rescued you, then?"

"I wouldn't be here if they hadn't."

He doesn't remember much about the ride or his arrival at the hospital: just a blur of pain and indistinct voices and needles of white light stabbing his eyelids, the torturous struggle between life and death. Not that he can take any of the credit for his survival: he couldn't even muster the strength to get his mobile out of his pocket. He still doesn't know who it was that found him on the side of the road. It's one of his great regrets that he never got to thank them, or at least pay for their upholstery.

When he woke again, hours or days later, Tom's first sight was of his mother slumped in the chair next to the bed. Abject relief washed over him, the raw emotion of the child who wakes screaming to find his mammy's cool hand on his brow, her voice cooing that it was only a dream. He shifted, made some sound, and she snapped to attention. "Tommy!" She hadn't called him that in years. "You're awake." _You're alive,_ her shadowed eyes said, and it was plain that she was still having trouble convincing herself that it was true. She coughed. "Are you in any pain?"

He wasn't. Or rather, the narcotic cloud he floated on made it so any physical sensation felt like it was happening to someone else. Things had jumbled up again in his mind. He hadn't a clue why he was in hospital, doped to the gills, but that sure had been a strange dream.

They were in a double room, but the other bed was unoccupied. Ma glanced toward the door and spoke in a low voice. "There's a detective outside. He said he wanted to speak with you when you woke up."

_Detective_. The people who solve murders. The word brought every detail rushing back. Tom closed his eyes, fighting a wave of nausea. "Son?" Ma quavered, a thousand miles away. "Son, are you all right?" He opened his eyes and she was holding a basin under his chin. He waved it away with his left hand; the right was bound to his middle with a sling, over a mountain of bandages.

"I'm grand, Ma." In that moment he knew two things: one, that she didn't know Declan was the one who'd shot him, and two, that she never could. "Detective, you said?"

She nodded, looking down as if she were ashamed. "On account of the nature of your injury, like." She gestured vaguely at Tom's chest. "He wants to get a statement from you, see if you know anything about the one who did it." She leaned closer. "What were you _doing _out there? Last I remember you were safe in my front room."

He thought fast, which was surprisingly effortless, but also dangerous: in his state he was liable to decide that telling her he'd been kidnapped by a leprechaun was a perfectly sound idea. In the end he took refuge in ignorance. "I don't remember much after we got home that night." He furrowed his brow what he hoped was a convincing show of regret: Ma was not the most critical audience he'd have to face.

She narrowed her eyes, thinking. "Did you go out? I remember I thought I heard the door closing."

He shook his head. "Dunno, Ma. Sorry."

She shook hers too. "Ahh, never mind, I probably dreamed it. I should let you have your rest." Her eyes went flinty. "But I'll tell you, I've never been on the Garda's side like I am now. We'll get this bastard, son."

Tom sputtered a laugh. "Ma!" _Language,_ he almost said.

She lowered her eyes, nearly bashful. "Well, he fecked about with my boy, didn't he?"

The interview with the guard, a Detective Sergeant Diarmuid Ripley, went as well as could be expected. He seemed to believe Tom's line about not remembering anything after arriving home from the restaurant; at any rate, he nodded sagely and said that trauma victims had been known to blank out on the last couple of hours before the incident. Tom had seen enough procedurals on TV to know that Ripley wasn't necessarily taking what he said at face value. He figured this was only the beginning of an ordeal of police interviews, clicking through screen after screen of mug shots, vaguely shaking his head at line-ups.

After Ripley left, Tom told his mother to go home and get some sleep. The doctor had seen him before the detective and pronounced him in stable condition, so she didn't have much justification to stay. "I'll be back tomorrow with your breakfast," she said. "The food in this place'll kill ye."

Between the drugs and the exhaustion of injury and healing, Tom was out in minutes. It was difficult to get any decent sleep: every footstep and voice echoed in the corridor, and people came in to check on him at what seemed like fifteen minute intervals. But he managed to remain in a state of relative unconsciousness for several hours.

It must have been some fundamental shift in the room's energy that pulled him awake. One second he was in a deep sleep and the next he was completely lucid and utterly terrified. It was like that dream where you know it's a dream but you can't wake up: the monster slavers at your heels, the ground rushes up to meet you. Your murderous younger brother sits quietly in the same chair your mother occupied hours earlier, close enough to put his hands around your throat.

Tom's heart seemed to seize in his chest. "Jaysus," he gasped, recoiling, and hissed again in the first real pain he'd felt since waking that afternoon. A morphine drip couldn't touch this.

Declan raised his hands, palms held out in the universal gesture of peace. "Howya, brother." Tom eyed him with suspicion. If he could slip in unnoticed in the middle of the night, there was nothing that said he hadn't brought some means of finishing what he'd started. "Don't worry," he said, "I'm not gonna hurt ye." Tom had his doubts—it was clear enough that Declan had meant for him to bleed to death out on that road—but kept silent. "I'll admit I acted rashly. You know what they say: when you're a hammer…" he spread his hands further out, shrugging.

_Everything looks like a nail._ Tom swallowed. "Is that what you call an apology?" His voice came out rusty.

"Are you goin' to apologize, so?" Declan's voice cracked whiplike against the beeping of the machines that monitored Tom's heartbeat, the flow of blood in his veins. Hallmarks of the life that could be gone in a moment. "You barged into something you knew nothing about, which was none of your business. You could've completely fucked me. Are _you _fuckin' sorry?" He stood and leaned forward until they were practically nose to nose. "Well, are ya?"

Tom fought the urge to shrink back. _He won't do anything in a hospital room, surrounded by people_. "Yeah," he said. "I am." It was true: he wished he'd never set foot in that back room. He wished he'd let Dec spiral into his inevitable flameout, free of any intervention.

That was good enough to mollify him. He stepped back. "So."

"So."

"Heard the detective was in to see you today. What'd you tell him?"

Tom shook his head. "Nothing."

"Good. Make sure you keep it that way."

Wrath boiled up, hot and sullen, but he slammed it down. "I'm not stupid." The word spattered out like acid.

"I know. You always were the brainy one, weren't you? Uni and all that."

The anger bubbled up again at the mocking note in Declan's voice. "Fuck you."

"Ah, c'mon now, I'm only messing." He sat down, smiling. Clearly he was enjoying this. "The question now is, how can we reduce the unpleasantness for all concerned? I imagine it wasn't much fun, coming up with bullshit for that guard today." He waited for Tom to shake his head. "There'll be more where he came from, you know. And as for myself, I don't much like having to constantly be looking over my shoulder."

Tom couldn't hold back a bitter smile. "You're worried about getting caught for _attempted _murder, are you?"

Declan shrugged. "Well, you're still around to talk, aren't ye? And there's more for you to talk about than what happened out on that lane." He looked at Tom hard, leaving him in no doubt as to his status: he was a loose end and Dec meant to tie him up, one way or the other. "I think," he said, "the best thing would be for you to emigrate."

Tom let out a harsh bark of a laugh, wincing as it made his right side flare. "Do ye not see the state I'm in? I can hardly even get out of bed." He snapped his mouth shut before he could add something stupid like _Thanks to you. _Declan's temper was not easily roused, but there was no sense poking at him.

"I don't mean tomorrow," Declan said. "Rest. Recover. Tell the police you didn't see the guy's face, you don't remember what happened... whatever, I don't care, but for fuck's sake keep it simple and keep it straight in your head. They'll latch on to any inconsistency like a cat with a feckin' mouse, and that's something I learned the hard way." He smiled ruefully, before his face stiffened into that stony expression that had so chilled Tom before. "And Tom, I'll say this straight out so there's no misunderstanding. I will kill you if you tell them anything else."

Tom nodded. "I know." He was beginning to see the sense in Declan's idea. Certainly he'd no desire to sit across the table from him next Christmas. "And if I say no? If I won't leave?"

Declan lowered his gaze, shaking his head. "Best not to think about that." He looked at Tom directly. "I'm doing this because you're my brother. I wouldn't do it for anyone else, and I won't do it for you twice. It's for your own good, really." He gave a chilly smile; he must have been thinking of some of the harsher discipline Tom had meted out when they were kids. "I don't mind where you go, as long as it's far away. Not England, sorry."

"One thing, though. Ma. I've been taking care of her. Kieran helps, but—"

Declan waved a hand. "I'll do my part there; consider it my penance." His mouth twisted.

"Not only money. She's getting older, she needs someone to look in on her at least every couple of days." Tom hated like hell to throw Ma and Declan together, but there was no one else. She'd never move to Swindon.

"Not to worry. If I can't do, I'll send someone. Every couple of days." Declan jerked his chin down as if adding it to his mental to-do list. Tom imagined some tracksuit turning up at Ma's door, telling her _I've come to hang that shelf for ye, Missus Branson_ and he almost laughed. "And I know I don't need to tell you to come up with a good reason for leaving. Say you've got wind of an unmissable business opportunity in Hong Kong."

Tom gave him a hard look. "Or that the sight of an Irish country lane on a cloudy night gives me bad dreams."

Declan cocked his head, arching a mildly amused brow. "Whatever you like. Have you got any money? I can front you some to get started if you need it."

_I don't want your fucking money._ "I'm grand."

"Good." He stood up and adjusted the drape of the legs on his trousers. "I'll look in on you once you're out of hospital, then." His tone held no threat. It didn't need to.

When he was at the door, Tom said, "Declan." He couldn't help it, even though he knew he should let him leave and feel lucky to be shut of him. "It's not you I'm doing this for."

A shadow of a smile fell onto Declan's face. "I know, brother." He opened the door silently and went out.

Tom didn't sleep again that night.

Maybe he should have resisted, told Dec he'd die before he'd run away. Supposedly his ancestry imparted a long and storied tradition of attachment to his homeland, but in truth he felt more attached to his life. He had no doubt Declan could (and would) follow through on his threats, should he balk at leaving or cooperate with the police.

There was plenty else to keep him wakeful. Whether Declan would come through on his promise to support their mother was an open question, but not one Tom could afford to dwell on. Kieran would do what he could from across the water. And then there was the matter of where to go. _Far away,_ Declan had said. _Not England. _Tom had some savings, but he had to assume that he'd be wherever he went for the long term, which meant finding steady work. Weeks later, after he'd settled on a destination and a feasible source of income, he would swing between trepidation and giddy anticipation; that first night, still half in shock, he could barely stand to think about it.

Nor was he equal to facing the layers of deeper meaning in the situation. His brother had tried to kill him. He would not hesitate to do it again. No matter how much bad blood they'd had between them, that hurt like hell.

Later, more than once, Tom told himself that there was nothing he could have done to prevent Declan's indifference to him or disregard for the rules of society. Some people are just bad. But the fact is that he was the main male figure in Dec's life while he was growing up, and it was impossible to shake the feeling that he could have tried harder. He could have done so much better.

He thinks sometimes that maybe he should've given Declan a good thumping that day in the alley. He'd given him a few already; they were brothers, after all. If not that, he should have gone home and called a doctor. Rung the police.

But he hadn't done any of those things. Instead he'd yelled at Declan to go on home in a voice that sounded reedy and nervous to his own ears, and Declan had slunk off with a look on his face halfway between smug and terrified.

Tom couldn't kill the cat. When he went back a few days later, it was gone.

-o-

By the time he's finished talking, the afternoon is shading into evening. Some time ago he slumped down beside Sybil again. She's holding his hand. Bathed in the warm sunset light, her solemn face takes on the rosy perfection of the subject of a Renaissance painting, inward-focused and almost holy in its loveliness.

Neither of them speaks for a long while. Tom is almost afraid to wonder what Sybil is thinking. She strokes the back of his hand, a steady soothing motion, and he tries to let himself be soothed.

"I'm so sorry," she says finally. "I'm so very sorry." Her voice is heavy. "I thought—I knew since you wouldn't talk about it, it must be bad, but your own _brother_—" She clears her throat. "Jesus, Tom."

Her head's down, brow deeply furrowed. Tom wants to reach up and smooth her forehead. "Well, don't feel too bad. I'm alive, at least." She looks up and he gives her a crooked smile.

She draws her lower lip between her teeth. "Does he know where you are?"

"Sort of. I mean, I haven't given anyone back home my exact address, though I'm sure it wouldn't be much work to find out. But I know what you're getting at. I don't think he'd bother to travel clear around the world if I didn't piss him off, but I've still kept under the radar as much as I can, as you've seen." Tom stands, holding out his hand. He's grown tired of being here, with that heavy story hanging about.

They walk back to the campsite, but despite the failing light and the mosquitoes that have begun to come out, being in the tent's the last thing he needs. He's not hungry, either, though he feels emptier than he ever has before and his head buzzes like it does when he's coming down with flu. He and Sybil clean up what's left of the meal she started, and then she goes into the tent. She comes out a few minutes later with two rucksacks, stuffed full, but when she hands Tom one it weighs almost nothing.

"Blankets," she explains. "I thought we might go for a walk."

They hike the trail they took yesterday afternoon. It's full dark by now but he keeps his torch switched off, following Sybil's up ahead and thinking of nothing except where to place his feet. At the lookout, the dark gives way to the rising half-moon and a glittering sweep of stars, the scenery painted in shades of silver and grey. She lays out her blanket, and they sit side by side on it. Tom spreads the second blanket over their laps. Her fingers in his are soft and cool; after a little while, they're soft and warm. They lie back and look at the stars. You can't just look at one of them; your gaze will always be drawn to the one beyond it and the one beyond that, until finally you give up and let your eyes go unfocused. They seem so close together, when really they're millions of miles apart.

They don't speak for a long time.

At first it's a comfort, the silence. Sybil is a solid presence next to him; they don't need to talk. But then Tom starts wondering where her head is, if it's as far away from his as he fears. "So what do you think?" His voice comes out sounding full of pebbles.

Her hand tightens around his, a brief squeeze. "I don't know what to think." When she speaks again the words come out haltingly. "What happened to you is awful. I can't even begin to imagine."

He couldn't bear it if Sybil thought the things he's thought of himself at various points during the last two years. But he has to know. "I suppose I could have handled it better."

"I don't see how."

"I could have… not run away." That's the crux of it. On the good days, he truly believes it was the only thing he could have done. Other times he's gutless, to have abandoned his mother to the tender mercies of her criminal son. To say nothing of the person whose fate remains unknown to his loved ones, if he's got any.

Sybil rolls halfway over so she's propped up on Tom's chest, looking down into his face. The moonlight glints sideways into her eyes. "You _ran away_ from a—sorry, I know he's your brother, but he sounds like a psychopath—who'd tried to kill you. That's the most rational course of action I can think of in that situation."

He says it straight out. "So you don't think I'm a coward, then."

"No! God, no." She gives an incredulous chuckle and flops over onto her back. "It might be horrible of me to say, but I'm rather glad you were a bystander, instead of being… involved in that sort of thing on a regular basis."

"Well, I did help dump a body."

"At gunpoint." Abruptly she rolls onto him again. "Tom, I've seen a lot of gunshot wounds. And do you know what? Almost none of those patients were doing anything remotely heroic when they got them. It's not like on TV, where the random customer in the bank wrestles the gun away from the robber and saves the day. You did what anyone else would have done, during that night and after it."

He still wishes he'd had the courage to do something different. Maybe she can sense it, because she leans over and kisses him. "You deserve to be happy," she murmurs.

Her mouth is soft on his, but it's wet and open and it starts a fire in his lower belly. Her hand on his shoulder makes his whole body tingle. He would have thought fucking was the last thing he'd want tonight, but suddenly he wants nothing more than to be inside her. He wrenches her closer with an abruptness that makes her gasp and then moan as his tongue thrusts into her mouth. They roll together so he's over her, her hands pulling the blanket tight against the chill as he kisses her throat. He can feel the past receding into the fragrance of her hair, the soft throb of her pulse against his lips. His hands are inside her shirt and he presses lightly into her ribs, solid under the silken skin: Sybil is here, he is here, this is where they are, together. Nothing else matters; except the future. _As long as it's with her._

She holds him tight, and he wonders how he ever could have thought she would abandon him.


End file.
